Liberate Your True Self

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Shana Tovah everybody! Happy New Year in the Jewish tradition, the beginning of a new year!
 
It is interesting to reflect upon diverse religious traditions, especially Judaism, because many of the holidays represented in this faith are very symbolic, very profound. I thought it would be useful for the context of this lecture to discuss the nature of new beginnings. Rosh Hashanah is known as the beginning of the new Jewish year. It commemorates the beginning of the civil year, especially. It also marks the anniversary of the creation of Adam and Eve. It is also a time to reflect, to understand ourselves more deeply, and to consider how to improve ourselves in the coming year.
 
It is also known as the Day of Judgment. This is highly significant in relation to this talk, primarily because if you have been following the sequence of these lectures, we have been exploring many practical psychological tools by which to discover ourselves and to make transformations in our daily life, how to overcome suffering, how to change our state of being, and how to change fundamentally, how to develop more equanimity and cohesion in our lives.
 
While Rosh Hashanah commemorates the beginning of a new realization and a day of reflection upon oneself, it also culminates in ten days later from now, in the Day of Atonement. So, there are ten days from Rosh Hashanah from today until Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, whereby one comes to a deeper reconciliation with the divine.
 
This lecture is primarily focused on judging our own defects.
 
What I want to emphasize especially is that to achieve real liberation of the soul, a deeper state of equanimity and compassion, a greater unity within ourselves and our community, the old needs to die. Something old dies with every new beginning, and so, we chose this topic for this day, Rosh Hashanah, because it is about beginning a new way of life.

​We see here an image of Moses freeing the Israelites from Egypt, and while Pesach, or Passover, has to do with the liberation of Israel from slavery, it also relates to how, when we confront our own mind, represented by Moses performing miracles and feats before Pharaoh, these histories represent deep, internal, mystical, psychological truths about the liberation of the soul from the slavery of the mind, freedom from slavery from Pharaoh.
 
So, we have been discussing the nature of self, who and what we are, but also how to change. In this topic, we are going to explore that part of ourselves which keeps us limited and conditioned, which creates suffering in our lives, and also the way to real freedom. 

Our Focus

We will define and describe and demonstrate the principle of what is known as mystical death, particularly within this esoteric spiritual work, this psychological path, and spiritual traditions.
 
We will also emphasize the nature, role, and detriments of what we call the ego. Now we want to emphasize that this term ego is not utilized in Gnosis as in pop culture psychology. Ego really means “I” in Latin, “self.” It is everything we identify with in terms of our identity, our personality, our name, our culture, but also our feelings and thoughts, our sentiments and will.
 
We emphasize, and this tradition emphasizes many times, that the ego, the sense of self that we currently have, is detrimental and destructive. It is by understanding this ego and also removing it, by which we learn to free the soul that is trapped in those states, within each separate sense of “I, myself, what I want and crave and desire.” We will also emphasize and explain how it is by removing defects and egotism like anger, pride, and lust that we really procure deep and lasting change. We will talk about what that looks like.
 
We will also provide examples and practices that you can use, because in Gnosis we like to be very practical, give many exercises how to perform this work, and we will give some guidelines for comprehending and removing our own internal defects.
 
I also think it is important to understand too that even the possibility exists that we can really radically change, but for that we need to understand ourselves and to remove our inner faults, our inner ego―our egos we could say, plural, because really what we call self is really a conglomerate of many elements, many errors, which all have a separate identity and praxis.
 
We will also explore and map the ways to orient ourselves, how to discern and navigate and even transcend our current psychological state within this gnostic path. So again, the term gnosis has to do with experiential knowledge, that which we witness and know for ourselves from practical facts, and so we will explore what the essential practices of the gnostics are. 

​What Do We Seek in Ourselves?

So, what do we seek in ourselves? We chose an image here of Christ crucified, the Master Jesus of Nazareth, who demonstrated with his life and blood a path that we need to follow within our internal reality. We included here a scripture, the Book of Romans, Chapter 8 Verses 5 through 6, which emphasized really a question or a statement, postulates that help us reflect upon what it is we really seek in spirituality, what it is we do with our own life, and what is our compass, what is our moral caliber, what do we really believe.
 
We do not show beliefs merely through declarative statements. We show it through our actions, and so through our actions we can demonstrate really whether our internal character is founded within spirituality, within the divine, or if it is merely a reflection of our own material identity and attachments.
 
This is important to understand, because many people approach spirituality seeking to gain something, if not for material worldliness and attainments, perhaps for spiritual attainments, for so-called titles and recognition, for praise, for belonging, for community. Really the whole purpose of any spiritual school is to teach methods by which to change, not to be attached to the mind, desires, or a sentiment in the heart. It is about transforming that which conditions our psychology.
 
Our psychology really has the potential to be transformed. But what energy are we investing in our psychological states?
 
Really, Jesus taught the path of renunciation of oneself, to deny ourselves. This has to do with this particular path related to the death of our own ego. This can scare and frighten people a lot, but it is the foundation and the basis of real spirituality. The death of anger produces love, because the soul that was trapped in that anger must be liberated from its condition.
 
It is processed in accordance with its shell, with its cage, and unless we understand the mechanism of anger so that it can be eliminated, we cannot transform and liberate the real love and spiritual compassion that is inherent within that state, that is trapped or limited and conditioned.
 
What do we really seek to develop? Is it pride, a sense of self that craves and adores spiritual things, phenomena, traditions? Or is it humility, an understanding born from the recognition that we truly have nothing to be supremely proud about, but that the only real praise is to the divine? The soul can resonate with that divine spark of real integrity and character that does not have any self inherent within it, but is truly of the πνεῦμα pneuma in Greek, the spirit.
 
There is some interesting points in these verses from Book of Romans that I would like to relate to you that emphasize the basis of gnostic practice that we are going to explain today, and which can help us to better understand how to move forward if we really do want the death of our own ego, so that we can be resurrected within the spirit:

For they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh; but they that are after the πνεῦμα pneuma (Spirit) the things of the πνεῦμα pneuma (Spirit). For to be carnally minded is θάνατος thanatos (death); but to be spiritually minded is ζωὴ zōē (life) and εἰρήνη eirēnē (peace). ―Romans 8:5-6

​There are some beautiful teachings contained in these verses. Obviously, to be carnally minded does not merely refer to an addiction to lustful sensations. It could also refer to attachments and cravings in the mind, desires of any type. These desires are primarily what we call ego, egotism, defects, states of self that crave certain impressions or sensations and arise in the appropriate moment in order to satisfy themselves. To be carnally minded is to be proud, to be angry, to be lustful, to be greedy, to be avaricious. But to be minded in this way is to be within thanatos, which is death.
 
This is not the spiritual, mystical death we are going to talk about today, but the death of our potential. However, to be spiritually minded is to work with zōē, “life,” and we explained in a previous lecture that the power of zōē, of life, it is precisely the creative energies, the sexual force.
 
How we utilize that power to create life, how we direct it within ourselves, determines everything. It can determine the transformation of our psyche, or it can be used to saturate our own defects through craving and attachment. Also, this creative power that we explained in the lecture called Empower Your True Self, also is what is the basis for eirēnē, peace.
 
That creative force, when it is harnessed within ourselves and integrated in a conscious and balanced way, helps to produce serenity of mind so that we can actually begin to meditate. Most people struggle with the science of meditation in themselves because they lack serenity. We emphasize that the basis of real serenity is knowing how to work with our life forces.
 
So, if we wish to understand better today what mystical death of our defects are or is, we need to understand how energy works, but also how to develop enough serenity in ourselves by which we can actually concentrate and not forget what we are doing. It also is the basis by which we develop our real potential. 

​What Does It Mean to Be Free?

​What does it mean to be free? This liberty that we are talking about is internal. It is not based or contingent upon any socio-economic status, any political party or belief, or any external cause. This term liberation is often used in the sociological domain, but really, in our spiritual studies, has to do with being free of psychological contaminants like anger or pride or fear. It is a state free from psychological affliction.
 
To be really free is to be able to approach very difficult crises and situations, but without reacting with so much pain. We can be working a job or career that is very challenging, very demanding, but with an upright character, a luminous and brilliant, divine personality, an intuitive and compassionate state of understanding. That is possible for us, but it means that we need to first see in ourselves, psychologically observe our own internal, afflictive emotions and thoughts, so that we can remove the roots of them and, therefore, be really free―free to do what is spiritually minded in a deep and lasting way.
 
This freedom of mind is clarity. It means to have perceptions and states of being that are very lucid, not merely in dreams, but in our daily life, lucidity in reference to knowing how to act amidst great ordeals, and to have the agency to not react to problems.
 
It does not mean we do not respond. It actually means that we do respond with greater wisdom in relationship to the hardships of existence. It is the ability to really have intelligence, to know how to face or “take arms against the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,” to quote Shakespeare's Hamlet, and “by opposing,” to “end them.” It means to not be controlled by any external influence.
 
This is why Samael Aun Weor mentioned in his book Treatise of Revolutionary Psychology:

The best weapon that a human being can use in life is a correct psychological state. One can disarm beasts and unmask traitors by means of appropriate internal states. ―Samael Aun Weor, Treatise of Revolutionary Psychology

​Those internal states only arrive when we learn to die to what is old in us.

​What Do We Want to Liberate and Why?

​So, what do we really want to liberate and why? We have emphasized in previous lectures that the soul or the potential for soul―the archetypes and blueprint, the principles, the forces, known as the Essence, the consciousness―is in a latent, inert, and conditioned state. The Essence, the real soul that can know reality and divinity, is trapped. It is conditioned. It is layered and caked over with mud, mud of the pluralized ego.
 
We refer to the pluralized ego as all of those defects or senses of self that we all have within, which we must learn to discover by watching ourselves.
 
So, if you can imagine thousands of different bottles containing pure water, that is a metaphor for our own internal, psychological condition. Our essence is like that beautiful water which can refresh our thirst, our hunger for the divine. It is that state that can, when it is freed and liberated from its shell, can give us access to all those beautiful experiences of a spiritual type, and all those virtues that we may long for in ourselves, and which we see characterized in great luminaries and prophets like Jesus or Buddha, Moses, Krishna, great initiates.

Our Essence, our soul, is trapped in all those different egos, different “I’s,” that are like the snakes of Medusa's head, to use a Greek mythological, narrative symbol. Here we have Hercules, the solar god, the great divine Greek Christ slaying the Hydra. That Hydra, with its many heads, is our pride, our lust, our fear, our fanaticism, our greed, our selfishness, our laziness, our impatience, our fear.
 
Our inner divinity must help us, but we have to do our part. We have to learn how to understand each ego in its manifestations in life, but also in their roots, so that we can destroy them when we comprehend them.
 
We cannot destroy what we do not understand. In the same way that we cannot escape a prison cell without knowing that we are even in a prison ourselves, and not having the key. Really, we need the key of certain spiritual tools by which to open the door.
 
That door is precisely our psychological understanding of ourselves, to enter a new way of perception. We have talked about this in the lecture on self-observation. We have to understand our defects, to see them in action, to study them, like we are studying some foreign creature, a strange being, like we are a director, or even watching an actor in a film.
 
When we destroy each ego after understanding what is exactly keeping us in prison, we can then break the shell, and therefore percentages of consciousness are then free. So, in the bottle analogy, when the bottle is broken, after we learn to extract the water, we then have the material and substance by which to create what is known as the soul, or as it states in the Gospels, “With patience possess ye your souls” (Luke 21:19).
 
This is because we have to work with the path of denying ourselves. We deny ourselves by first looking and observing our mind and emotions, our desires to act, and really understanding what these internal, mechanical, and sometimes often unconscious reactions are, which originate from ego.
 
So, the soul or the Essence is integrated when we really break the shells that trap it. In a way, the old Arabian metaphor of the genie in Aladdin's lamp perfectly describes our predicament. If we break the bottle, we free the genie. This is the source of real genius, real intelligence, real power, real mysticism. In that way, we can deepen our understanding, and also understand other people, because when we see that our own defects keep us trapped, we can learn to free ourselves, but also help others do the same. But that can only come about if we are really studying ourselves and changing.
 
When the ego is dead, really the Essence or the soul realizes its divine nature, and then it can experience permanent enlightenment. So, I know in many spiritual schools and movements, we all talk about spiritual enlightenment, but oftentimes we might mistake a temporary vacation in such a state with permanent residency. So, what we want in order to become permanent residents of spiritual enlightenment, is by removing all the shells that keep us trapped within hell.
 
Only in that way can the genie perform any feat of magic that we wish. Our soul can perform that miracle, like Moses parting the Red Sea, or Jesus walking upon water―beautiful stories that hide deep truths, deep mysticism.

​Why Must the Ego Die?

​Why must the ego die? So, we have already been talking about this.
 
Our ego, our anger, our pride makes people suffer. It also makes us suffer, even though in the moment we may feel satisfied for getting our particular appetite for pain fulfilled.
 
It is very ironic, very paradoxical. Anger is a very destructive emotion. There really is no profound use for it, no matter the justifications or the excuses. This is not to say that by eliminating anger, we become pushovers. It means that we know how to be severe when we need to.
 
The ego makes us suffer, and it processes our own states in accordance with the conditioning of our mind. We also explore the reasons for mystical death, because by eliminating ego, we also free ourselves in the long term with great pain. So, I know people who have read Samael Aun Weor’s writings, the founder of our gnostic tradition, where he explains how this path of mystical death is a painful process, and it is. It is painful to confront our own traumas, our own defects, our own errors.
 
But it is also very painful not to face them, to ignore them.
 
Then, by the end of our life, the great crises and the inevitability of death of our physical body, we have to face the reality of all that which we ignored. The truth is that if we do not willingly remove our own ego through a conscious path of spiritual work, then of course what will happen is, you know, physically we will die, we might not get another opportunity in another life. If we do not change, then nature will do it for us. This process has been known in different religions. They call it hell.
 
I do not say this to scare people or to promote fear or the adherence to a fanatic belief. The reality of those infernal worlds mentioned in different religions, and even Dante's Divine Comedy, is an exploration of what will happen to the psyche in terms of its own process and transmigration if it does not change.
 
The reality is that we can change in this life. We can work to remove our own ego willingly and gain a lot of knowledge from it. So, in the short term it is very painful. It can be a quicker process than postponing it for another time.
 
It is actually a very urgent call to action. So rather than promote fear, we are trying to emphasize the urgency of our situation and that there are great benefits to eliminating anger in our lives now, rather than letting the forces of nature take us unconsciously into inferior states where eventually, through a process known as devolution, that ego will be destroyed and the soul will be freed, but after much pain, but without knowledge, without spiritual development.
 
Authentic enlightenment is realized when the causes of suffering of the ego are annihilated.
 
There is really two ways. One can enter an internal revolution with oneself now, remove all these problems, causes of suffering within oneself, and actually gain a lot of wisdom from it. But to ignore our own really imperfections will not remove the problem. In fact, things will get worse.
 
So, it is a warning. It is very alarming and can be disturbing for people and it is very shocking. However, it is the reality. It is something that we can really understand by waking up, by observing our situation, but also, we can gain great hope, great inspiration when we see that we can do this work, if we have the inclination. 

​Divine Inspiration through Mystical Death

​In synthesis, mystical death leads to divine inspiration. So, I know a lot of people when they think about Samael Aun Weor’s teachings on mystical death, the death of the ego, the Buddhist Annihilation―which are all very severe terms―people get very frightened by that.
 
Unfortunately, not realizing that it is by dying to the old, dying to the ego, in which we give birth to the soul, and that real beauty is found by facing oneself. This is why Samael Aun Weor mentioned that:

Death is the crown in the path of life. This path is formed by the hooves of the horse of death. ―Samael Aun Weor

​Our life is crowned by all the actions we took in our life until the moment of our physical death. How we live will determine our conscience, what we will perhaps feel gratitude and happiness for, but also remorse. “Death is the crown in the path of life.”
 
Spiritual life is formed by eliminating the imperfections, by dying psychologically as Jesus demonstrated on the cross, by climbing the mountain of Golgotha, “the place of the skull.” We too can enter the straight and narrow way. That straight and narrow path is precisely the death of the ego.
 
But I do want to emphasize too that while a very serious work, there also is very great joy in it. I think people get very hung up on the somewhat sour and morbid nature of death in general and its connotations. We have a lot of assumptions and fears around death, ignoring that as an inevitable reality, it also offers many promises.
 
Samael Aun Weor made a point in The Revolution of the Dialectic, how really mystical death is the greatest joy of the gnostic. In fact, our greatest happiness comes by discovering our own errors, because by understanding the root of our problems, we can change and therefore we can celebrate. He says:

For the Gnostic, the greatest joy and celebration comes from the discovery of one of his defects, because that discovered defect will become a dead defect. ―Samael Aun Weor, The Revolution of the Dialectic

​So, when you are observing yourself in a situation and you see maybe a thought of pride or anger emerge, and you comprehend in the instant what it is, you say, “Aha… I have caught you! Now I can work to fully eliminate you, this error, which is creating so much pain in my life!” There is great joy in that.
 
I think some people get caught up in very sour thinking that they see how many defects they have and then they want to cry. There is remorse too and sadness, a type of lament and understanding our situation. But also, there is great joy when we have the tools in action. Then when we work effectively to observe this process in ourselves, there is a sense of inspiration born, really through expiration: the death of our desires. 

​Principles of Retrospection Meditation

​The method is this: retrospection meditation.
 
We have included a link in the PowerPoint, which will be available on our website too, of a former lecture we gave called Retrospection Meditation. It was the final lecture in a course on Gnostic Meditation. I am going to mention these principles briefly here, but I suggest that if you want to go even deeper, that you study that lecture.
 
We go into great detail in full length about all these principles that you see here. I am going to synthesize them:
 

1. Relaxation
2. Retrospection / Visualization
3. Serene Reflection of Mind or Mood
4. Psychoanalysis of Root Impulses
5. Mantra or Koan
6. Superlative Analysis: How the Ego Works
7. Self-Judgment: Creative Comprehension
8. Prayer and Execution

 
So, with the practice of retrospection meditation, we first want to relax. We enter a state of meditation: calm our body; calm our mind; calm our heart.
 
Afterward, we are going to visualize our day. So, precisely the work of meditation is that we are observing ourselves all day. We are gathering data about certain defects that emerge within our mind, heart, and body. They can be related to pride, anger, fear, gluttony, whatever it may be, whatever label. These defects always emerge in relationship to certain situations that repeat.
 
You may find that as you are observing yourself throughout the day, that you may have more or less clarity about what you are seeing. I suggest that when you are beginning this type of meditation, after you have calmed your body and relaxed, that you visualize in your imagination everything that happened in the day, everything you can remember.
 
If you are meditating at night, you can reflect retrospectively from the moment you sat down to the moment you got up in the morning.
 
Or if you are a meditator in the morning, you can retrospect your dreams. You can reflect on what you experience in the internal worlds. This meditation can also be performed in reverse or retrospection in reverse.
 
If you meditate in the afternoon or evening, you can also meditate from the beginning of your day to the end―whatever is easiest for you. There is no set standard by which how to do this. What matters is that you are reviewing in your imagination what you saw in yourself, and you are trying to just recall what happened.
 
Do not try to change the memory. Do not try to change what happened. Just recall―what did you see? What thoughts or feelings did you experience? What desires did you enact? What did you say? What did you do? Try to see with as much clarity as you can.
 
So, in the former lecture [Imagine Your True Self], we talked about imagination as well, how to develop a robust visualization capacity, and so, if you want to go deeper into actually clarifying your imagination more, I recommend you study that previous lecture.
 
But in synthesis, as you are visualizing and reflecting on your day, what you saw in yourself. You can also serenely reflect upon your current state of mind and mood. You will find that as you are visualizing what happened in the day, you might start to react to things, and this is very common.
 
You might start to see your own resentment or reactivity emerge from a conflict at work. Maybe you had an argument with someone or someone said something that jarred your sentiments, “ruffled our feathers,” so to speak. While you are visualizing the event and what happened, as you are trying to be dispassionate and neutral, you also want to serenely reflect upon any reactions that emerge.
 
So, examine what is your mental state and your mood, because your own reactions to the visualization are also very compelling, too. There is some deep relationship there. I suggest that if you are feeling some negative emotions about an event and you are stewing in the state itself, that you take the time to reflect and direct your attention to that particular reaction, because that has something to do with whatever egos you are studying.
 
By having enough relaxation, equanimity of mind, and separation from our own associative thinking, we also have the ability to go deeper into the roots. This is psychoanalysis. We reference the term psychoanalysis not like Jung or perhaps Freud, but indicate the need for comprehending with our consciousness the roots of these defects.
 
We not only want to understand our reactions to things, but also we want to go deeper into the real causes of these egos. As you are serenely reflecting upon a scene and maybe you saw three different egos, you could take maybe 15-20 minutes, however long it takes, to reflect on each ego separately and try to clarify your mind and watch and visualize that ego, ask for understanding from our own inner divinity to show us what is going on here.
 
Psychoanalysis involves understanding the deep mechanisms or roots of these errors. It could involve understanding where the ego came from. You may have a vision where suddenly, as you see a past life where that ego of pride has been living very fat and very fed, and which is the originator of the current circumstances of our current life.
 
It is possible to see that. I mean, you can get a vision or you see something in your imagination all of a sudden when you are not expecting it. That can be a bit of a reflection of the roots of that defect and can give you insight where you say: “Aha! Okay, this is where that ego came from. This pride came from then, maybe, when I was even a rabbi, a Jew, within the tradition of Israel.” Maybe we lived in certain past existences feeding a mystical type of identity.
 
Now, psychoanalysis also can teach us not only the root of where an ego came from, but also how it feeds, what are its thoughts, what are its attitudes, what other egos does it relate to. Psychoanalysis involves understanding the series by which a chain of associative defects emerge.
 
It is rare to find an ego that exists on its own. It has to relate to usually pride and anger and other defects. Maybe they are deeply rooted in fear. Maybe the primary emotion or defect that is running everything is a specific type of ego. We can call it our chief psychological feature, our chief psychological characteristic feature, our main error, which really characterizes our worst faults.
 
Those can often be masked by, or really some defects could be masked or hidden or related to other errors. So, it is all interconnected. By understanding the connections between our own defects, we can become more free, and the less power these types of impulses have within the roots of our subconsciousness, our unconsciousness, or our infraconsciousness.
 
In the process of working on this meditation too, you might find that working with a mantra can help. I know some meditators, in order to relax deeply, will chant mantra.
 
Mantras, if you are not familiar, are sacred sounds. They are vocalizations or prayers from different religions or different languages. Some of them are from Buddhism or Hinduism or even Christianity, Islam, Sufism.
 
Mantra means “mind protection,” and a mantra, a vocalization or prolonged vowel, or perhaps a sacred word, can help charge the mind with good energy. That good energy can help develop serenity.
 
Now while mantra is included here as the fifth step, really, I do not want to confuse people in thinking that these eight parameters are sequential, like they are plateaus that you have to master one in order to move into the other. These are principles, and you may apply these in different aspects or parts of the meditation. They are principles by which to understand ourselves.
 
You can do mantra when you are relaxing. You can also do mantra as you are trying to understand an ego. You have to utilize the tool when necessary, and only you can judge when that is appropriate.
 
Perhaps you need more stability of mind or concentration, or a deeper insight into a problem. A koan is a Zen term for a riddle, and sometimes you can pose a question to the mind to make it quiet, such as “What is the sound of one hand clapping?” You present that question to the mind and wait for the result. The mind will try to answer it with many excuses, and the whole point is to evoke the actions of the mind to see them for what they are.
 
You begin to see that it is our potential to be free that is actively looking within oneself and studying all the mechanical processes of the mind. In the same way that a child could perhaps blabber on or maybe talk for an hour, maybe you want to, in this metaphor, let the mind exhaust itself like a child. Maybe the child will talk and talk and talk. The mind will talk and chatter and reminisce and think. The whole point is not to shut it up or force it to be still, but just to watch it. Eventually, as the mind is trying to solve the riddle but can not, we will begin to quiet and relax and eventually become still.
 
So, mantra or koans are very good for that. They help to develop silence of mind.
 
In the process of working with mantra or even superlative analysis of our psychological states, we begin to understand really the depth of how the ego works.
 
So, this does relate to psychoanalysis. As a principle, this analysis is not intellectual. Some people get caught up in this meditation thinking that thinking is the, well, thinking in itself, is the groundwork for this meditation.
 
In the beginning, we need the intellect to understand and analyze the ego. There is some comprehension to be found even in having a basic intellectual analysis of our own errors. Now to go deeper, we want the mind to be quiet. So, in the beginning, yes, we need to analyze our ego. But the analysis we are also talking about here has to do with activating the consciousness. It is a conscious analysis. It is a conscious state of being. The soul must learn to analyze. It is not an intellectual process. It is a perceptive one.
 
We learn to perceive all the mechanisms of the deep roots of our psyche, really the roots, how they function, how they operate, how they feed the whole tree of our inner tree of death. Or in Islam, we refer to it as Zaqqum, the opposite of the Tree of Life, the Tree of Being. We want to understand the roots so that by understanding the roots of ourselves, we comprehend and eliminate.
 
Self-judgment is precisely found when we have creatively comprehended the depth of an ego.
 
Now it is also important to remember too that certain egos have more superficial layers. Not all of them are deeply rooted. But obviously the best work is found when we go at the roots of the tree and hack it down there.
 
Self-judgment occurs when we comprehend an ego very profoundly. You understand many things: where it came from, how it works, how it takes our energy, how it steals energy from others, how it occupies our mind, how it makes us suffer, how it makes us react.
 
Self-judgment is precisely a creative state. That creative comprehension, the term used by Samael Aun Weor, refers to a state of understanding that creates a new way of life. Comprehension really changes us. We have to understand ourselves and that creates new conditions and new states of opportunity when we learn not to react with those egos, when we can understand them.
 
To understood any ego, we take 15-20 minutes for a defect, to understand, perhaps, and then afterward we pray to what is known as the Divine Mother. The Divine Mother is the divine feminine, a derivative of our Being, a derivative of the divine.
 
She has been known by many names in different religions. She is also known as Maryam in Hebrew, Mary. She is Athena. She is the goddess Minerva, who helps the Greek heroes in their battles against many hydras, monsters, defects, horrible creatures.
 
That is a metaphor for us. She is the one who can eliminate the ego. When we pray to her, after understanding ourselves, she executes each defect.
 
What you do is you visualize that ego and how you see it in your imagination. You can see that defect manifesting in your brain, your heart, and your body. You imagine even a sword decapitating this defect.
 
She is Kali in Hinduism, the Divine Mother Death. She destroys any demon defect / ego, kills it, pulverizes it with the sword of her insight so that the soul can be extracted from it. We pray to Her using different mantras, such as Krim or the mantra S, as well. You prolong those vowels. 

​How Do We Know the Ego is Dying?

​Some questions that arise as we are working in this path is something that many people ask: How do we know the ego is dying?
 
So, it is not enough to know the method. It is also important to apply it, but also to understand the results, because sometimes I think people get caught up in expecting certain results from their lives in this practice, and maybe get disillusioned and discouraged because they do not see what they desire. Obviously that in itself can be a problem.
 
So, I want to clarify a couple things in relation to the path of mystical death based on some common questions and answers from students and emails and messages in the forum, which arises within any student who is practically working in this.
 
We will emphasize that comprehension of our behaviors is what can produce remorse. This state of remorse has nothing to do with shame.
 
Shame as an ego is negative. Conscious remorse is the soul that recognizes its own shortcomings while having insight into a particular problem. It can be a painful state, but also it is an elevating one, not one born from egotism, but from understanding.
 
We can see that we are dying to certain egos as we develop remorse. Even though we remarked how discovering our defects produces joy, it is an interesting dynamic that we also can feel remorse, joy and remorse.
 
It is a bittersweet quality. Remorse for our errors, but also the joy of “Yes, now we know the way to change,” with the defects in ourselves dying slowly because it takes time. It is a process.
 
We have an increased disinterest in even perpetuating wrong behaviors. So, you will find that you are really dying to certain egos when you do not act on them. You can see them for what they are whenever they emerge. Maybe a certain element of anger arises in relation to a certain situation. As you are entering that ordeal again and again, and you are watching your mind, you see that that anger has less volume. It has less influence on you. It has less control. That is a very good sign. It means that we are slowly starving the beast.
 
It also involves the willingness to suffer consciously. I think this is something that many people do not like. There is suffering in this work, but the willingness to suffer voluntarily, to face hardship and challenges in order to change, is precisely the catalyst for real change.

​So being willing to face that situation where our anger emerges is precisely the path of Christ wearing the crown of thorns, a symbol for us of how we need to control our mind, not repress it, not gag it, but to understand it.
 
In the process of remorse, in a sense, we do bleed morally. It is a state of pain, but not egotistical or exacerbated by even more compounded suffering, contradictions or complexity or conflict. We have more inspiration for deep change. So even though the situation is hard, you feel a sense of inspiration that “I am going to face this ordeal today and even suffer for it. But I am going to understand the root of this anger that is causing me pain and others pain.” That is a necessary, fundamental attitude, an inversion of perhaps avoidance or wanting to run away from situations.
 
There are also frequent and deeper recognitions of psychological states. As we are dying to our egos, we get insight. We see for ourselves that behaviors that we have are problematic, and also we understand other people better. By understanding our own errors and changing, we can better understand our humanity and therefore have more compassion, rather than judge or condemn others for not being what we want them to be.
 
Obviously, this is very difficult to do, but as we are dying to our own defects, we have a greater equanimity of mind and we are in a better position to be of service.
 
We also know the ego is dying as we are renouncing our specific internal states that relate to pain, or certain egos or defects that we know create problems. We directly have wisdom and perception in the moment that, you know, certain behaviors are wrong, and so we renounce them, not out of fear or shame or repression or trying to run away, but understanding.
 
It is impossible to renounce something we do not understand. That is really avoidance. Renunciation is when we comprehend our state and the state of others, and we choose not to act in an inferior way of being, but actually enact a superior level of being, a better way of acting. It is a conscious choice born from intuition and conscience.
 
We also see that specific habits or errors are gradually diminished or disempowered. Like I said, with time, the anger becomes less robust, has less power over us. It is slowly disintegrating because we are comprehending it more. It is disempowered.
 
But it is also important to emphasize, too, that even in the path of mystical death, certain defects will fight back, and usually the ones that are the biggest have the most energy invested and have the most at stake.
 
Like a lion that has denied food, certain defects will fight back. For some people, it is their lust, and this is actually very common for the majority of students. Lust is a big defect, and people may struggle with vices like masturbation because they have a big ego of lust, and so it is very painful for them.

​They repeat a process of attempting spiritual practice, but then succumbing to their own desires when that animal is not satiated, and so it is painful. It is also more painful to be stuck in the myth of Sisyphus, working to roll the stone of our spiritual work, create a force up a hill, in a sense, in a metaphor, and then letting it drop whenever we succumb to our own desires.
 
So, egos will fight back for nourishment if we do not feed them. Now, the goal or the way out of that vicious cycle is comprehension, to really meditate with retrospection meditation on how this particular ego is acting, to see what are its forms of food, its psychic impressions or sustenance that keep it nourished. Yes, egos will fight back, and I think the solution really is to have a lot of patience with oneself because this is not an easy process. It is possible, but it takes will. It takes repeated effort.

How Do We Know Certain Egos are Dead?

​Now, the question becomes, “How do we really know that certain egos are dead, like fully eliminated?”
 
The reality is that we do not repeat the same errors when we are offered the opportunity.
 
So, if we have an addiction to coffee, perhaps we want to reduce our coffee intake. Maybe a situation arises in which we are able to get a free drink. Maybe we do not take it. We are able to practice temperance or abstinence in a more conscious sense.
 
Now, I mean, this is a very superficial example, but on a deeper level, maybe you face a situation that repeats again and again, where your anger is provoked or used to be provoked. Now, you do not even have an inkling of anger. That is a very good sign. It means that our level of being is more stable. It is elevated. It is more intuitive. It means that we are able to understand how to act and respond to a crisis and without anger or without pride, whatever ego it is we have worked on.
 
We also have more inspiration and understanding by which to be in the moment. In a deeper sense, there is even no temptation in the deepest levels of the mind.
 
So perhaps to give an even better example, one could be an alcoholic, and by really comprehending and eliminating the egos of alcoholism, one can be surrounded by drinks and parties and yet not be tempted. That is a very powerful state to be in.
 
Now, mystical death is even also confirmed through dreams.
 
So, while the examples I gave just now are related to physical metrics of our daily life, how we measure our progress, we also can have internal experiences that confirm things. You might have a vision or a dream of being in a coffin or going to the incinerator, visions or dreams of death, cemeteries, symbols that represent that certain egos have been reduced to dust. That can give us great hope and real inspiration too. That is also possible, and those dreams will correlate with our daily life. Do not just take a dream at face value, but examine how it relates to certain circumstances in your life. There is a deep correlation there that gives us a more well-rounded understanding of things.

​The Nature, Qualities, Causes, Reasons, and Remedies for Spiritual Nights

​Now, we also want to emphasize too that in the work of mystical death, many people get disillusioned. So, we have discussed this topic with many students over the years, and many people have even become very discouraged because they attempt these practices, they have practiced for a number of years, and yet feel like they are not getting results.
 
We often call this state the spiritual night. So, the very nature and qualities and causes, the reasons for the spiritual nights has to do with a necessary step in our spiritual evolution. It is necessary to undergo these hard moments in life characterized by intense loneliness, maybe an overbearing materialism where we forget spiritual practice or forget our spiritual life but focus more on the material.
 
It is a state of being in which we are absent from the divine. We feel like we have been abandoned. We feel like we have no orientation. We lack understanding about what to do. This is very common: melancholy, sadness, despair.

​This state was characterized by Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata, where as an initiate he was undergoing a very deep spiritual night. That spiritual night was very prolonged and had a deep relationship to his growing deafness, because Beethoven became deaf in his career as a musician, as a composer, and that was a great source of pain for him where he could not hear his music anymore, and so he suffered a lot.
 
But the reality is that he underwent that crisis because he had to understand something in himself. We all go through a period or many periods of disillusionment and pain, spiritual nights, because we have to develop maturity. Every initiate experiences a spiritual night, and even many of them, including the greatest masters.
 
In fact, the greatest masters have faced the greatest depths of sorrow. This is a necessary ordeal to teach maturity. Divinity could not train us to be competent, independent, and strong-willed if we never face that feeling of Christ on the cross:

Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani… My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? ―Matthew 27:46

That is a necessary step, because unless we are not challenged, we will never grow. Divinity gives us these hardships intentionally.
 
In a sense, maybe in the beginning of our spiritual work, we have a lot of light and wisdom. We feel inspired. We feel great joy. We feel or experience many internal mystical states. We have many visions and dreams. But then with time, divinity says, “Okay, you have seen the light, now we are going to withdraw from you to see whether or not you could handle this on your own,” or better said, “with the illusion that you are alone,” because really divinity does not leave us.
 
Divinity withdraws in the same way that a martial arts trainer will step back and allow us to test our skills at a dojo. We have to learn to become masters of ourselves, so that loneliness is a necessary ordeal.
 
Now, the reason why it is also painful, too, is that divinity, in a sense, does not welcome us fully because we have ego. We do not deserve it in the full sense of the word. Also, humanity may reject us in our daily life because we are different. Maybe we are working on our ego. We are enemies of the ego. Oftentimes, there is a period of disillusionment when, as we are becoming serious students of disintegration of the psychological “I,” we may have a period of dissonance with other people. Maybe we feel we do not relate to others. We do not belong, and that is a great source of pain: to be rejected by heaven and then to be rejected by humanity.
 
Now, these periods can last months, even years, even decades. These states can compel us to escape through drinking or materialism, entering the vanities of the world, becoming more worldly.
 
While it is important not to forget that our daily life is precisely our initiatic path, it is also in relationship to our attitude that a spiritual night, and even a spiritual day, relate. It is important to remember that we do not want to avoid the world. We want to be in the world, but also have the right approach.
 
Initiation, the spiritual path itself, is developed precisely through the path of meditation. So, if we feel that discomfort or sadness, that despair, we lack inspiration―the solution is meditation. I suggest―meditate on virtue. If you are overwhelmed and sour with pessimism or despair, regret over a certain ego, a lot of pain and loneliness, I recommend you meditate.
 
Meditate on virtue. What does virtue look like in your life? And if that is hard to extract from the circumstances of our existence, then meditate on the virtues of a saint. Visualize a prophet. Meditate upon a Jesus, a Buddha, and examine what character did they display even when they were fully rejected and despised. Understanding what virtuous qualities exist in ourselves but also have been demonstrated by the prophets and what is possible for us can get us out of the rut.
 
So, while we talk about death of the ego, it is not enough to meditate on our inner defects. We have to meditate on virtues too. Because virtue is that inspiration in the moment, that remembrance of self, remembrance of divinity, that guides and orients our afflicted heart. When we see how virtue can change our lives, we are indebted to it. We will defend it and strengthen it no matter the cost, even when things are not in our favor. So, it is a real test. 

​But if you want an example of an initiate who succumbed or better said, overcame the spiritual night, again look at Beethoven.
 
He composed the Moonlight Sonata, a very painful piece. But in the end, he composed his Ninth Symphony. The Ninth Symphony is the Ode to Joy, the most famous piece he ever wrote.
 
He was completely deaf. He could not hear a note of his own music, and yet he composed it out of sacrifice for humanity because he loved humanity so much and was inspired to provide this teaching of music about the joy of divinity, even at the cost of his own life, at his own expense of not even being able to hear a physical note, not even once.
 
He overcame the spiritual night and he found inspiration at the end because he meditated. He reflected on his own Divine Mother and he remembered her.

​Obstacles to Spiritual Progress and Their Remedies

​These obstacles to spiritual progress often are our worst enemy. It is also good to reflect and remember that oftentimes our own metric for success is precisely what keeps us chained.
 
We may have impatience for immediate results. Maybe we want immediate astral projections. We read Samael Aun Weor’s books on dream yoga, but also Jinn states, his meditative experiences, his visions and dreams, and we become inspired. We want to have that.
 
But oftentimes the desire for mystical realizations or enlightenment and wisdom is precisely the problem. Desiring powers will not give us power. In fact, it will create despair.
 
It is good to long for change and to aspire to these heights, but not out of desire or coveting powers. In fact, the impatience for results or certain experiences often is the very obstacle that we need to work on if we are really diligent in this path. Those experiences will come as we are eliminating our ego, but not because we want them.
 
It is like brushing our teeth. You do not have to look forward to it. You do not have to glamorize it. You just perform hygiene because you need to. It is a chore. You do it, not because it is something profound, but because it is something that you do for your well-being.
 
In the same way, we do these spiritual practices too. The results come with time, not because we rush. In a sense, nature is gradual.
 
Spiritual life is a seed. We have to cultivate it patiently. It only becomes a tree after many years of growth, nurturing, development.
 
A seed does not become an oak within one day, but after many years of trial and fortitude and of careful tending on our part. If we are longing for results, even for a few years, for certain experiences, I would invite you to reflect on the desires themselves because that can often be the worst obstacle.
 
The craving for something, the desire for a partner, the desire for an experience, the desire for a gnostic matrimony, the desire for acknowledgement or praise, desire for belonging in a spiritual community or a group, longings and desires, or better said desires―because longing we can say is a state of the soul―produces pain.
 
The soul can long for the truth and aspire and work, and it can show us our level of being and help us get through the hard times.
 
Now the reality is that only awakening our consciousness can really show us where we are at, not what we fear, not what we doubt, not what we disbelieve or believe, but what we know. The metric for real change comes about by examining our mind here and now, awakening ourselves, being present and watching. Only in that way can we gather the real data about what is going on and not assuming that we are one thing or not, but seeing it.
 
That is important to reflect upon and remember, because it is easy to just get caught in doubts or disbelief, or maybe just belief, the attitude that we think we are doing it. Do not assume. Just watch, observe, because if we are asleep, we will not recognize the progress that we have actually made, nor perceive how we actually sabotage our best efforts.
 
Some people do not give themselves enough credit. Maybe some of us are more pessimistic by nature, maybe depressive by nature, introverted, where even though we could be making great progress, we think we are not. The measurement is to study our psychological reactions to life.
 
Are we changing in how we approach life, our attitudes, our perceptions about relationships, about ourselves, our community, how we connect with others, how we relate, how we help others? If we are not observing this process, we will often sabotage our best efforts, thinking that we are not getting the results we want, or having some kind of false ideal, a statue in our mind, an idol that keeps us hypnotized. It is good to be honest and to be self-critical when we need to, but also very patient with ourselves, too, because we need to have humility and to try and try again.

​Common Doubts and Their Rejoinders

​Some questions that naturally arise as we are working in this path have to do with self-observation, self-remembering.
 
Now, we often get similar questions online, but also in lectures, as well as other platforms, too, about whether or not, “How we know we are doing the work correctly.” So, some questions can include, “how does one know they are doing self-observation and self-remembering correctly?”
 
Many of us know self-observation. We are examining our thoughts, feelings, and desires. We are watching them.
 
Self-remembering is recalling and evoking the state of virtue. It is remembering the qualities of divinity in ourselves, like happiness and compassion, patience, diligence, altruism, faith, knowing from experience, direct knowledge, intuition, serenity, diligence. Self-observation is when we extract data from our inner states, but also self-remembering is when we connect with the state of virtue.
 
We know that we are doing it right when we get inspired. We feel that sudden “aha!” moment when we are watching ourselves and we gather data about a defect, but also we feel joy that we are connected with virtue.
 
Some people also ask what the real spiritual metric is for measuring progress. Sometimes people think that “if I have not had an astral experience in five years, ten years, I must not be doing it right.” Well, I mean, astral projection is a skill. Dreams and visions are skills, but the important thing to remember is that divinity manages that whole process.
 
We do our part, like brushing our teeth, doing our duties, but the results come and the measurement is found by examining our daily life. Really, the only useful benefit of a dream or vision is if it teaches us something about what is going on in our current life. Dreams and visions are not separate from daily existence.
 
We measure our progress based on our psychological work. Are we reactive to certain situations? Are we more patient? Are we more kind?
 
Dreams will show us that progress when divinity wants it and when we need it, not when we want it. The spiritual metric for change is examining how we are changing in our situations and circumstances that repeat.
 
Do we repeat the same negative behaviors or do we change? That is the real surest ground of real understanding. Also, it is also important to reflect on what spiritual desires exist in our mind in relation to achieving so-called specific “results.”
 
Again, we have talked about this already. What are the results that we really want? Do we really want profound change in our daily life to liberate our states of being from suffering or do we crave some kind of mystical ecstatic state?
 
Also, what do we really seek from self-observation, self-remembering, and meditation in relation to our own lives?
 
To ask the question, what do we really want from these studies? What do we want? What do we crave? What do we long for?
 
T connect it to our life: what are the things in our life that we want to change and what are the things that we want to keep? Or if we want to change everything, what do we want to do?
 
And to examine and ask, what can self-remembering actually do in relation to that?
 
We have to study self-observation and self-remembering here and now, because that is the foundation of liberation of the true self, the mystical death of the ego. Also, what might self-observation and self-remembering look like practically in relation to specific events in our life?
 
It is important to reflect on what does it practically look like to actually apply the tools and see how does it work, because when we see how it works, when we get inspired by how the tools effectively help us engage in our life and act a superior way of being, we get joy. That is a good sign.
 
We also can examine what an effective practice looks like. If we are practicing and we are not getting the insights we long for, examine that, reflect on it and be honest. What is our approach?
 
What attitudes do we take into the practice?
 
Are we distracted all the time?
 
Do we lack serenity of mind?
 
Do we lack the ability to visualize?
 
There are many tools in different lectures that teach us how to develop certain skills when we have a certain deficiency. I recommend studying a lecture we gave previously in the Cultivating Virtue and Conquering Vice course, the lecture called Strategies for Mind Training.
 
We give a lot more practices about how to develop self-observation and self-remembering too, and to reflect, what does an ineffective practice look like? Maybe because we lack serenity or concentration or whatnot.
 
Also, how do we really know we are truly failing or succeeding? I think people fail to remember too that we are very short-sighted. We do not see the full picture of our daily life.
 
We think that if our situation is negative, like at our careers or jobs or family life, maybe even our marriage, that things are going bad for us spiritually. Now, the reality is that we could be just getting a lot of ordeals because they are helping us to see something in ourselves. Divinity is helping us to see ourselves.
 
Look at Job in the Bible. He was persecuted to the ends of his sanity, but he held on and remembered, “Unto divinity I came and unto divinity I shall return.”
 
We know if we are failing or succeeding based on awakening consciousness.
 
In a sense, many times when we think we are failing, we are not. We could just be being tested very severely. Or if we think we are succeeding, maybe we are very proud. We do not know it, but we think we are getting certain results. It could be something very superficial.
 
Now, to know where we are at spiritually requires that we awaken consciousness, examine our daily life, and even the connections with that to our dreams.
 
Lastly, how is success and failure measured in our own daily experience? What does success look like for us? What is our criteria? What are we measuring our success by? Is it success in accordance with our mind or success in accordance with our heart, our conscience?
 
So, at this point, I would like to open up the floor to questions.

​Questions and Answers

​Question: I feel that if I do not eliminate my ego, then something bad will happen to me in this life. Is this a microcosmic reflection of my possibly being on my 109th life?
 
Instructor: Yeah, I know people have that fear too. For those who are not familiar, human beings, individuals are given 108 opportunities to change. Meaning in terms of the path of reincorporation or transmigration, we are allotted 108 existences in a humanoid body in order to perform this work. Now, to know where one is at in that process requires that we awaken consciousness.
 
Obviously, we do give a bit of an approximation for most people. We tend to be in our last few lives because things are really complicated now. We have reached the end of our opportunities typically, and we now have the opportunity now to change. Maybe we are on our last life. Maybe we are on our 108th, maybe 107th.
 
Rather than get preoccupied with the fear of that, or maybe even the paranoia, the despair that “maybe I am going to enter the infernal worlds and devolve and be destroyed in hell,” it is better to step back and reflect. That former statement is fully based in fear. It is not the soul speaking there.
 
The reality is one thing. The reality is too that obviously, if we do not change fundamentally, then obviously opportunities will be lost. But the reality too is that if we are working on ourselves and are very sincere and have remorse and are trying to change on a daily basis, we get help. Divinity can extend that process in accordance with our needs and also with accordance with good deeds.
 
So yes, there is that reality. Obviously, if we do not eliminate ego and we continue to cause suffering, then we have to face the consequences of that. That is just the reality.
 
But as for a sinking suspicion that this is a microcosmic reflection of possibly being on the last life, I would not say that necessarily. I would say that maybe there is an intuition there, but you have to verify that through investigation. So be patient.
 
Question: Any specific way or method to work on forgiveness? 

​Instructor: There is a very good meditation available within Tibetan Buddhism which is very powerful. It is called Tonglin. One meditates on the suffering of another person, even an enemy. Perhaps that enemy gets sick, someone who maybe harmed us in some way.
 
We learn forgiveness by learning to take on the suffering of others, even those who cause us pain. While it could be very difficult to perform this meditation, it could be very moving and upsetting, especially to recall, perhaps, the wrong that someone committed against oneself. By learning to help people, even when they hurt us, is a powerful and beautiful skill that is truly divine.
 
Forgiveness does not necessarily mean allowing oneself to be hurt again, but it does mean that one changes one's attitude towards an aggressor or someone who maybe harmed us in some way, in any way, really.
 
You can also meditate upon three things, three people. Pick a person that you love, pick a person that is a stranger, and then also pick a person that is your enemy, who has perhaps given you grief.
 
You visualize each person separately. You visualize and imagine the feelings that you have for someone you love. You imagine and visualize a stranger and the and see the feelings that rise-up in relationship to a person that you have a conflict with, whom you struggle to forgive.
 
You cross-compare the sentiments and feelings that you have for each of the three in accordance with this person. You develop forgiveness when you see that even this person, this enemy, is a person. This person suffers, has pain, and while they may have committed a great wrong against us, we learn to forgive by examining our own reactions and understanding our own traumas too, because it can be very difficult to face that in oneself.
 
In fact, it can take many meditations to really get at the root of that pain, and many tears too. We also develop forgiveness when we comprehend and eliminate the egos of resentment. So whatever egos in ourselves that feel angry or hurt by this person, we have to retrospectively analyze and meditate upon those defects so that we can see their roots, where they came from, how they were fed, how they enacted, what they were reacting to.
 
We may find even in a meditation that the reason why this person hurt us in this life is because we did the same to them in the past life, and that can give us a lot of intuition and understanding. I mean, that can really shock us. It can really change our attitude.
 
We often receive situations in life because we committed those actions in the past, but maybe we are not remembering it. That is how far ego work can go, and we have forgiveness for people when we hit the roots of those defects and cut them with the ax of understanding. So retrospective meditation on that will help.
 
Question: We have a question. Do you recommend any mantras relating to the Divine Mother in connection with this lecture other than Krim and S? 

​Instructor: Yes, the mantra O AO KAKOF NA KHONSA. That is an Egyptian mantra relating to the divine feminine. It was sung and pronounced by the priestesses of Egypt, as well as many initiates and priests of the initiatic order of Egypt itself, the pyramids of Giza. Also, there is the mantra RAM IO, very powerful and very beautiful.
 
Those mantras can help us remember our Divine Mother, but the mantras Krim and S relate specifically to annihilating defects, so those are particularly powerful for destroying any ego that we have comprehended. The other mantras RAM IO and O AO KAKOF NA KHONSA are really good for remembering the Divine Mother.
 
Question: When you say hygiene, such as brushing your teeth, how long would that mean a meditation practice? How long would that relate to in terms of a meditation practice?
 
Instructor: So, obviously the thing to remember is you want to start small and build from there.
 
Do not try to meditate for an hour or two hours if you have never done it before. Take small steps, you know, build on your practice gradually as you are seeing the benefits naturally. Otherwise, you may try to do too much and burn out.
 
So, start with 15 minutes. Start with reflecting and retrospecting for 10 minutes as a baseline and then visualize, if you can, for another 5 or 10 minutes in the beginning, a certain ego that came up in the day. Keep it simple and, you know, if you need to take a break, take a break.
 
If you want to go back to the practice, go back to the practice. You should feel refreshed from your practices, not strained, like this is a chore or a burden, “something I do not want to do,” right? It has to be something that you engage with and feel reinvigorated by.
 
That is a good sign that we are doing it right. Sometimes practicing for small spurts, but many frequent exercises or frequent times, can help us build the stamina that we need to go even deeper. So, you obviously want to build on the meditation gradually.
 
Start with 15-20 minutes as a baseline. You can do more if you wish, but see the benefits of the practice from trial and error and give yourself some time. So yeah, we will also conclude a link to Cultivating Virtue, Conquering Vice, the lecture called Strategies for Mind Training.
 
Question: There is a question. I have heard that you cannot annihilate egos at nighttime. Similar concept to you can only create solar bodies at night. Do you know anything about this?
 
Instructor: So, this question relates to a practice within alchemy, within gnostic couples or people practicing sexual magic, where the solar bodies or vehicles of the soul that are created through the sexual act, through tantra, can only be performed at night.
 
So solar bodies can be created only in the nighttime by practicing with our spouse in the evenings when the sun is down, because as Samael Aun Weor explained in his books, the sun is the enemy of generation. We cannot create something in the sunlight in the same way that a child cannot be born in the sunlight.
 
That is why a child is born within the womb of its mother or a chick is born within the egg away from sunlight. In the same way, the solar bodies are only created when we work at nighttime.
 
You can destroy egos at any time of day.
 
Some couples, if they practice alchemy in the daytime, can only eliminate egos. They can not create the solar bodies in the day. So, if you are single or practicing as a single person, you can still annihilate egos at any time.
 
But if you wish to annihilate egos if you are married by working with the perfect matrimony, you have to do it at nighttime. But also, you can work on the death of the ego in a matrimony. If you are practicing alchemy in the daytime, the only work you can do is annihilate the ego.
 
You can not create the solar bodies during the day. That is the only distinction we make. Solar bodies are created at night, and if you want to practice alchemy in the daytime, you can not create the solar bodies. If you are practicing alchemy in the day, you can only annihilate ego during the sunlight hours.
 
Question: When I misparent my daughter, I feel extreme guilt. I think this is also tied into me being unable to forgive myself. I know that remorse is helpful to change, but I can see this extreme guilt is not helpful to me, and it is causing more suffering. Do you have any advice on this?
 
Instructor: Yes. Reflect on the love that you feel for your daughter. Examine the real virtue that you feel in your heart in relationship to her. It is important not to fixate only on defects or on mistakes.
 
It is easy to become very morbid and sour. In fact, I think the big problem in spiritual movements is that we see a lot of our own mistakes, and we become discouraged. We make errors, and we may have a hard time forgiving ourselves.

​I recommend you work with the magic of the roses. It is a very simple, beautiful practice. There is a video of it available through Glorian Publishing, their website.
 
We will provide a link in the chat for you at the very end here where you can perform this ritual. It is a simple practice. It involves getting roses, three roses, three glasses of water, pure water.
 
You put a rose within each glass. You pray to the divine feminine, the divine intelligences of the planet Venus, who are the angels of love, the angels of forgiveness, of serenity. You ask for their blessing.
 
You ask for divinity's blessing to work with the intelligence of the elementals of the rose because every plant has a soul. The souls of the roses are very evolved and very beautiful. They are living beings.
 
Those roses or those elementals, those souls of the rose can provide medicine within the water. That is it. Roses and water.
 
You drink the water in sequence before breakfast, before lunch, and then before dinner in order. The video has more details about that, but personally, when I have suffered spiritual emotional pain, having made certain mistakes in my own life, I would work with the magic of the roses. That radically alleviated my guilt.
 
Now, obviously, I still had remorse because guilt is an ego, but remorse is a quality of the soul that takes accountability for its mistakes, but not out of self-flagellation and shame of morbidity and despair. Work with that exercise. The magic of the roses is very powerful.
 
You can work with it for as long as you need. It can help alleviate your suffering to a certain degree so that you have enough stability by which to change and also to have enough strength by which to work and to make the changes that you need to. It can give you peace of mind.
 
Question: We have a question. Do you have any references to understand ego within trauma or PTSD?
 
Instructor: The procedure is the same with any meditation of any ego. Obviously, certain traumas are related to egos that we created in this life or maybe even past lives. I know a lot of soldiers who have been through war have experienced PTSD. It is a very terrible illness to experience.
 
Oftentimes, many of these people have committed actions that they could not have anticipated or believed. They deal with the trauma of perhaps having killed or nearly being killed, and so that can create a lot of suffering. And so it is also very painful to relive and to remember that.
 
Obviously, we recommend, especially if a person has suffered through a certain trauma that is experiencing PTSD, that one can rely on psychological professionals, mental health professionals. It is good to talk with experienced people who know about these conditions. There is people who have a whole living based on helping people with this problem.
 
Now, the benefit of spiritual practice in conjunction with this can be retrospection meditation. Now, retrospection meditation can help us go deeper, and it is also much more demanding. It requires more skill and energy and effort, but also requires that we relive, in the case of a soldier, for example, the moments in their life in which one experienced that trauma.
 
That can be very difficult to do. But even in clinical studies, they have discussed how by learning to voluntarily face one's fears or traumas from the past, even reliving them in the imagination, can cause short-term discomfort and a lot of pain. But the long-term benefits are astoundingly great because that particular psychic knot of energy that was trapped within the psyche of the person gets unloosed, and certain tensions are resolved as a result of revisiting that experience.
 
With retrospection meditation, too, that practice can help us untie the knot of certain past traumas. It can be very painful, obviously, but it does result in good benefits because one can reconcile and understand in a deeper sense why those situations happened.
 
Understanding can give one great peace. So same practice, retrospective meditation, but obviously with an intense trauma or suffering from PTSD, you know, certain impressions or memories can be very painful to deal with, but by voluntarily facing them and patiently studying them again and again if necessary, one can gain deeper insights and have greater stability of mind afterward as a result.
 
Question: For those coming out of religion and having a hard time understanding the Divine Mother and, you know, who would rather pray to Jesus or Allah for the disintegration of the ego or the “I,” do you feel they can still accomplish it?
 
Instructor: Yes, because divinity does not care what name we give to divinity. You know, the terms, the labels are just the terms. The Being is what is real, whether we call divinity Allah or Christos or Athena, there are many names and forms for that reality.
 
Those people can still learn to disintegrate the ego if they are understanding themselves and if they pray sincerely for the divine in their heart to disintegrate what needs to be disintegrated. So, it does not matter what language we speak, what culture we come from, what beliefs we have. What matters is the reality, the reality of our situation and our experience. Declarative beliefs or postulates do not show the depth of who we are. They are merely surface level criteria for a deeper spiritual reality. We can know these truths from experience. 

Now, what is interesting even in the Muslim tradition especially, you know, and since you mentioned praying to Allah for disintegration of the “I,” there is a symbol in Islam for the Divine Mother. Al-Buraq is the mystical creature that took Muhammad, Prophet Muhammad, from Mecca to Jerusalem and, you know, there is many forms of different religions that teach the same reality.
 
So, I would not get caught up on the symbols but, you know, pray to whatever aspect of divinity really inspires us. You know, Jesus represents one form! but Miriam, the Divine Mother, is something very special. Obviously, we can have more power if we are more in tune with our divine feminine but, you know, even people who are averse to religion can learn this process if they are sincere.
 
So, I thank you all for coming. Appreciate the turnout! Thank you for the attendance.
 
Hope this lecture was beneficial to you and we will have more lectures coming online soon. Keep a lookout on our meetup page. We will be able to schedule some coming up, and thank you all for coming!