Martin Muller - April 1984

CALISTHENICS APRIL 1984

· THERE IS A BRIDGE – A NEW FUNCTION OF THE MIND – GAP TO BE BRIDGED ALL THE WAY DOWN –SOUNDING – EVERY CELL VIBRATESIN THE EMITTING MODE –IMMEDIATE/NOT MEDIATED—NINE HIERARCHIES IN THE INSTRUMENT –CHECK THE MOVEMENT –DO WITHOUT THE HEAD – RELAX PATTERNS – REFEXIVENESS – SOUND IN THE HEAD TO TEACH THE MIND – SOUND QUALITIES WAY BEYOND CONSCIOUSNESS – AWARENESS PROPER TO SOUNDING--

As of this Easter, the Christ Impulse has become operative on the level of the persona in mankind as you know it. This means you no longer need to reach beyond the gap, because there is a bridge and the other side may now come through. The main impact I would like to make is that it is a drastic change of condition, a huge turning point. I want to say a few words about this, so that you might relate to it, not simply as information but as reality.

For people who work with us, this is working now, but it has taken 2,000 years to bring this along from the actual event of Jesus' crucifixion. Up to now, the Christ Impulse has remained fully and completely esoteric for the normal consciousness, so you could extrapolate and say that it might take many another 2,000 years to realize that it is now. Working to give out this life through-out the whole instrumentality (including the persona) implies a very serious reeducation on the level of your patterns, be they mental, emotional, or sensory.

I could also add that this event might mean a lot more to those who have a sense of action than to those who have a sense of teaching -- be they in these groups or anywhere else in the world -- because it is essentially an action situation.

Also, if you follow the usual teachings, they tell you how to reach the other side of the gap; they condition the persona, providing you practice of course, to become more and more sensitive to other conditions. These teachings are now obsolete, but I have to add that they are obsolete only for those who have already trained an ability for the comedian to come down into the mask.

Let's make an analogy. Suppose you decide to make an expedition, for instance, to Mt. Everest. You will possibly prepare for years. You will prepare yourself to be physically fit. You will arrange your finances. You will organize everything in your life so that it will be possible for you to go there. Then finally you make it. The moment you have made it, all movements of preparation are gone. Preparation is obsolete. Becoming fit in order to be able to make it is obsolete. All this is now done. It's no longer the same situation. of course, you have to make allowance for evolution. The speed at which mankind works is rather slow, so the fact that preparation is now obsolete might show in ten years, it might show in 10,000 years. The speed at which it will show depends on each individual, and it's not the same for everyone. So that which is now obsolete for some will still have its use for a long time.

Do you have questions pertaining to this situation?

Participant: What caused this change to happen?

…. Symbolically speaking, in the prior period, causality was very important. Now we realize, even in physics for instance, that the particle is an expression of the dynamics of the whole. You have not just one cause, but dynamics of the whole working. We could go back and say that the cause was Christ's incarnation, and then, knowing how slow people are to register, you could take this into account and say that this is why it comes out only now. This is very oversimplified because there are huge systems of powers at work that the mind's sense of causality cannot deal with. You would be better off to speak of goals. It is said, for instance, that there are nine creative hierarchies, and man, as mankind, is the tenth. Now all the creative hierarchies are known to work in "heaven," and they can do tremendous things. Well man can do just as much. But I don't know if you realize what it takes to clean the mind of all the preconceived ideas. I don't know if you realize what it takes to discipline the mind to take into account those finest, most subtle qualities that you cannot even express in the least way, and have the mind respond to them, not try to process them, but give them out. This is a new function in the mind.

…. it has happened, so it is now. It's a very serious proposition. How many thousands of years will you take to realize that now is now?

Usually you can trace the inability to function now to a frame of mind. You want to reach something for yourself. It means you are not connected to the world, you don't give out. For someone who gives out, something has to be given. now. When you have an appointment at a certain time, you have to be there, so you are there. It always strikes me that things are very self-evident in everyday life but not in spiritual life. If you are called to do something then you do it -- and this means now -- but if you are dreaming for your progress, you don't hear the call. You have to be more pragmatic. We are really involved in an action, and all that prevents you from realizing it is simply the old frame of mind of following a teaching or a teacher. Change the pattern into action and then you can work in the now. Then you will realize that Christ is not so far away.

Participant : If someone had asked me whether anything special happened this Easter, I wouldn't have been able to give the information that you've conveyed. So my question is: How might I have noticed, or how may I yet notice this striking change?

Martin: First, I took the pain of telling you of the event. I'm fully aware that most of you are not really aware of the action, so I give you clues.

You know, we deal with events, and if you want to be sensitive to what is going on, you have to start dealing with events too. You have to be action-tuned. The "how" is in the realm of production. You give, and what you give is your own life, that life that you vibrate, with all the qualities involved. There is no place for a question, it's a practical situation.

Participant : Has there really been a gap for the last 2,000 years, or was it the effect of that mind set you have spoken of?

Martin: Long ago there was a council of the church in which the emperor in the east and the priests created a model of religion that they liked very much, and the teachings that already existed, being contrary to the model, were suppressed. it is this emperor who gave the order to burn the Library of Alexandria. Those who have some knowledge agree that this was an enormous setback because it was the biggest treasure of knowledge on earth, spiritual and otherwise. Also the persona of Jesus began to stand in the way, and what had started to bloom at the persona level in mankind was killed. Today you still see churches sticking to man-made dogmas that have nothing to do with the action. All this reinforced the gap instead of suppressing it.

You might have noticed that for a relatively short time now, perhaps a century or so, teachings from the east and west have surfaced to a degree that they never did before, and are better understood, although far from what is really meant.

So for all practical purposes there was a bridging with the initiates, but they were the only ones. They have worked for it to come out and now it comes out.

Participant: How do you know this? I don't understand.

Martin: Obviously you don't, because the way you want to understand does not work. I say this because there is a point you absolutely have to learn: The models your mind gives are rarely adequate. When you ask "how?" it is the mind asking for a model, even if it is only symbolic. You have come here long enough to realize that we have another awareness -- whatever you may call it. You might have a hard time realizing it, even if you witness it, because you haven't realized that when we speak of "Other" we know what we speak of. That awareness we speak of is "Other", terribly "Other." You cannot find any feature in this awareness that is duplicated by consciousness, so the word "Other" is very proper. The problem is it's a reality not a fiction, and reality is a lot harder to face than fiction.

So when I say that it has happened, I want you to realize that it has happened. The implication is that the situation has changed. It is for you to act accordingly. We happen to be pioneering, so the situation is completely fresh. The adjustment to the situation is not instantaneous but the possibility is here.

The time has come for you (the real one) to take over. For Atman the point is what it can express through/with the persona, what it can bring out. The gap, being bridged on the highest level, now has to be bridged all the way down. The way the persona has known itself absolutely has to go. This is easily said, but to do it is another story, because your persona responds to the average level of society and you have to get free of that. The persona has to respond, not to the average level of the surroundings but to Atman. This has to be trained in whatever way you can, and by this I mean with or without your consciousness

Another point: The habit of looking for God or for Christ somewhere else is gone too. If you want to know where to look for Christ, look right here in any aspect of the personal in the very substance of the physical body, or in any body, however fine, of any instrumentality that was this side or the other side of the gap. The problem for you is to take away the veils, the habits of looking in certain ways, and recognize it. Learn to make blanks.

….. According to the old mode, a blank is a passive action, but this is not what I mean. I mean allow yourself to function otherwise than with your consciousness. It implies a very precise functioning in which you stop using the same old means, when there are other ones available that the consciousness doesn't know.

For instance, you are Atman, but there is nothing in your person that realizes that it is real. You are still looking for it. You sense it somehow, but do you have the courage to admit that you are it? Can you stop following the images that the mind has made and assume that position? The mind makes images of Atman, and most people are perfectly happy with these images. It is said that the mind is not conscious, so what is consciousness? If consciousness is not the known functions, then the consciousness implied is something totally different. These functions are only the reflection of Atman. Now if you are very serious, and you realize that these are reflections of ... then, speaking in images, you make the entire surrounding as quiet as possible so that you can hear/live the reality instead of the reflection.

Participant: The pattern of blanking is so much the passive way that I can barely hear what you are saying.

Martin: But you have an inkling?

Participant: Yes.

Martin: Okay, follow that. It will bring some life, some reality into facing "Other." Facing "Other" implies a definite action. But most people would say: "How can ' I act facing "Other" if there is nothing?" This is precisely the situation. I have quoted Patanjali I don't know how many times with his sentence about Atman projecting itself into chitta. It is not the mind that is conscious, it is Atman. If you go through all and every one of the awarenesses functioning in you and you bring them all under one heading, you will realize that there are lots of sensory perceptions that do not come under the full control of the mind. There are lots of emotional situations that do not come under the control of the mind. There are lots of mind functions that do not come under the control of the mind. Still they all make sense. Sense to whom, to what? There are so many situations in which you decided you wanted to do one thing and when the time came you did otherwise. Following what? This means that there are functions in your consciousness that your mind has no idea of. What heads this? The time has come to face it.

Sounding

Today we will begin a training related to what is happening that will give you ways of expressing that are not dependent on conscious functions. You have the ability to do it, even if your consciousness does not understand, and this is a tremendously important point.

In the new situation, the key word is giving, contrary to the past where the trend was getting something for yourself. Therefore our training also has to pertain to your ability to give out. We will train this with music.

In this respect, I want to make an analogy between the persona and a loudspeaker. When you listen to music, the part that is alive for you (sensorily) is the loudspeakers -- because they vibrate, they make sound, and you hear music. But what comes to the loudspeakers is not music, you are actually in the presence of three different movements (electric, magnetic, and mechanical) only the last of which brings out the sound. In a way this is a little like how you work. For the ordinary consciousness, the electrical impulse could be related to the mind, the magnetic to the feelings, and the mechanical movement to the sensory world.

The point is this: For the loudspeaker to be alive it has to vibrate, and it so happens that for you to be alive you also have to vibrate. Now the loudspeaker is not devised only to vibrate but to vibrate in a certain direction, so that the sound comes out and you may hear it.

Translate this to your persona. Forget about the old images when listening to music, and when the music begins to play, allow (and I do say "allow" not "order") every cell in your body to vibrate the music in the emitting mode.

When you hear the music, the relation between what you hear as music and the reaction of the cells playing the music is immediate -- not mediated. You do not have to direct the action mentally from your brain, or emotionally from your plexus. Just let it happen. Now when I say "let it happen," this is an active position that knows what it does. It knows that when the mind is directing some part of the body to vibrate then the action is not working -- perhaps it vibrates, but this type of action does not emit. According to physics you vibrate anyway, so vibrating anyway, let the cells sound the music. When you have a bit of experience with this, you will begin to realize what sounding is. In the "Statement of Purpose" we speak of sounding, now you have to learn to do it.

So we are going to play a piece of music. Just allow that vibration of music to be emitted by all the cells of your body, all over simultaneously. As the theme of the music moves you will notice that there are movements like a displacement of the center of gravity throughout the whole body, sometimes in one place and sometimes in another. A first simple reaction might be that you respond to low notes at the feet and to high notes in the head. You will notice, however, that if you allow it to come out this will change very rapidly and become a lot more sophisticated. So you cannot use a fixed pattern. Experience also that you can live that sounding without your mind. Sensory awareness can exist without the mind or the emotions, it's an awareness by itself. The mind, for instance, is simply decoding, if you ignore the decoding the other functions still go on by themselves.

Remember, the one that is aware, the one that is playing the music, is not consciousness, it is Atman. When Atman plays the sound goes out. It makes an effect in the room. But to begin I don't ask you to come out as Atman, if it happens it happens, but don't expect it. I have a reason for saying this. If you expect it, it simply means you are going to produce an Atman just as beautiful as Patanjali has described. While this could happen spontaneously, you could just as spontaneously realize that a projection is not what you want, you want the real situation.

But the main point to register is your ability to vibrate cell-wise, all over simultaneously, and thus you emit the music. Don't bother about what kind of sound comes out, it's a sound that the sensory awareness doesn't know. Still there is an outpouring, a radiation, an emanation. As you do it you will realize that you have the ability to respond practically instantaneously to the variations. You don't have to process the signal first in order to ... This you can skip. You will begin to learn the direct mode of action, because your experience will be that if the situation requires it you can bypass the mind -- you can use it, but if it's not going along with what has to be done you can bypass it. This kind of vibration is not dependent on the mind or on any conscious functions.

Okay? So let's start with the first piece.

(music)

I want you to observe in the room that we have something quite unusual: active people. Doesn't it strike you? Something productive is coming out. You can't say exactly what, but at least you can feel that you are busy with something that comes out. Isn't it a relief?

Now that you have sounded, let us say, on the level of consciousness, there is something I have to tell you about this kind of sounding that you are not aware of. If we take the model of the ten hierarchies (with man as the tenth), all of the nine previous hierarchies have worked and given their own life substance to man. You have the life of all these nine hierarchies in you. This means that the instrumentality, beside that which is known as the persona, is something stupendous. Please don't underestimate it, even on the conscious level.

Now when we speak of sounding, that sounding can be done on all the levels implied, not just with the persona, although the persona has to get acquainted with it. But once you are acquainted with it you might become aware that you can do something that your own consciousness does not understand, this means you can positively work without the understanding of your own mind. I know what I speak of, it happens to me all the time. it's perfectly real.

You also need to become acquainted with shades and subtleties, so we are going to play a second piece. This time you follow all the nuances and vibrate those nuances out into the room. okay, let's do it.

(music)

As you practice, learn to check yourself. As a group, for instance, you have one check that is fairly easy. Look at the feet to see if they are becoming alive. When someone is processing in the head and directing from the head, the action doesn't come down to the feet, although it may come down to the hands. Ideally speaking, your whole constitution being involved,you ought to have the same "light" or lightness all over. You don't see a light, but when you become alive there is something that becomes lighter somehow -- lighter in amount of light and lighter in feeling of gravity, of weight. This is an observation you can make when you are together in groups. You usually cannot do this when you are alone because your mind might be biased.

Another point that I noticed with some of you. You get too involved in observing what is happening to the body, meaning you take that from the the vibration, instead of being entirely involved in the positive action of sounding. One thing you don't realize is that your minds are completely accustomed to self-reflection. Whatever you do you reflect back on yourself. The Doer does, he doesn't care about the reflection. The immediate action is not self-reflexive. So when I ask you to sound, do just that -- sound -- no comments. As long as the music lasts you sound and that's it. When it's over you stop the action.

Then be sure also,, in order to check your tendency toward passive observation, that there is movement. As I said before, the center of gravity, if we can speak that way, or the focus of the music, moves constantly as the melody moves. If you sound all over but there is no movement, then you have turned into a frame of passivity. You feel yourself vibrating, but, because of self-reflexiveness, you don't give out. Self-reflexiveness means coming back on yourself. You have to learn to come out. Period. The exercise is meant for Atman to come out, it is not meant to give the persona a reward. There is no reward, so don't expect one.

So we will play the third piece. In this piece you sound dynamically as well as nuance-wise -- both together. I am aware that we go a bit fast, but you can train this at home.

Incidentally, when you train at home, be careful what kind of music you use. Music like jazz and rock are related to the sub consciousness. If you start sounding this type of music you will revert to subconscious dominance and the chance for Atman to come out will be gone. I mean what I say, I have seen this happen. This kind of music definitely takes you away from the higher elements in life.

So lets play the music.

(music)

Do you have questions, after this first experience ?

Participant: This personal, mental energy that wants to direct the action is so used to doing something that if I take it away I experience that I check out. This seems inappropriate.

Martin: One of the greatest difficulties is to realize that you can really do something without the interference of your head. It will be easier once you realize that the real you is already directing the action. What is on the other side of the gap is coming through, and it starts working in ways you haven't known, so you have to revise your ability to do things. On the other hand this is precisely the beauty of it.

You also have to remember that we deal with patterns, and most patterns have their root in the subconscious, so you cannot force your way through, because it doesn't reach the roots. What you have to do is repeat and repeat and repeat, until it sinks down. When you have that mind activity popping up, you simply relax, until it's gone. If it pops up again, you relax again, and so on.

There is also a slightly different presentation we can make on the same aspect. If you are in an action and the mind, not being tuned to the action, pops up, you forget it -- not because the mind is no good but because it is a tool you cannot use at the moment. So you go back to the main action -- again and again and again. As you do this you will notice that you will begin to have more facility in telling the mind to be quiet. At this stage, when it's easier, you will realize what you can do with relaxing. In the new situation that we are in, things are done by relaxing. You will find Christ in the structure if you relax sufficiently.

The most common mistake is to fight. Now fighting the movement gives it strength because you put all your attention on it. So logically you have to put your attention on what you want, not on what you don't want. This kind of discipline has to be learned. Make no judgment.of value, if something pops up and it's not what you want, go back to the main subject. After a while you will have some grip on it.

…. You spoke, for instance, of a situation in which the interference blocked action in certain parts of the body. When you are used to going back to the action, you can go back to the action, whatever the block. You are never in the best condition, but you cannot wait for that. Not being in the best condition doesn't prevent you from doing it anyway. "Doing it anyway" is something you have to discover for yourself. It's deeply true. If you cannot do it because you have a headache, it simply means the mind has decided that in this condition you cannot do it. You have to challenge the proposition, and, one day when you have a headache, prove to yourself that you can do it anyway. These are little things but this is what the training is about.

Participant: I’m experiencing a fair amount of mind interference. I experience a vibration in my body and my mind looks at it and that keys the mind into motion, and I have to be very careful not to allow it to proceed. One of the things that I did that seemed to be effective was ask it to face "Other." I set it a task and then left it alone. Then another kind of awareness still was able to scan the body and check to see if it was vibrating. I'm wondering if there's not too much involved in all of that, if I'm doing too much? Does it show to be effective?

Martin: Mind interference is to be expected, because you need a certain amount of training, but you don't stop sounding just because the mind says something. Let's say the mind is a kind of other noise. Your attention follows the sounding, so that little by little the other noise is left aside. Little by little the mind realizes that it's importance is not that big.

There is another subtlety in what you came up with -- that other awareness that checks what is going on in the body. You have to be careful with this because with the same description you can have two entirely different situations. In one you are still ego-centered and in the other one you are aware because there is a sensory awareness that is able to register the sounding, and as the sounding moves through the body you happen to be aware of the movement. You cannot explain it, but you are aware that it is actually happening. It's a delicate situation because you can easily shift into reflexiveness. Reflexiveness is a feature of the ego. When that self-reflexiveness comes in then you want to double-check to see if you are doing it correctly. What you learn by practicing is that when you truly sound you live that condition, and you check, not by features, but by life. But that's another story. This will come eventually.

There is something that might help you. When you checked your body, did you check inside your brain? Did it vibrate?

Participant: As far as I could tell.

Martin: Did it occur to you that your feet vibrated more than your head? Not in the spontaneous movements, but in the moments when the head took over.

Participant: Oh yeah, probably then, because then I wasn't checking.

Martin: It's something I find quite interesting and amusing, although it's not amusing for everyone. The mind is used to looking from the head to the body, ignoring itself. In this case it might help to sound the music entirely in the head every once in a while, with your attention on all the cells sounding. This is a mode that is not familiar at all to the mind but it learns by it. So you get your head cleaner. Also you can free yourself of mind interference a lot more easily if you do this. But the main key is that you don't fight what doesn't go right. You put your entire energy in what is to be done and you do it. You will be surprised how you can little by little align all activity to that. In the persona the mind dominates, in the whole it is merely an instrument, adequate for some things, but very inadequate for others. So you have to learn to be free of mind. But this is not a rebuke to the mind, it simply means you need to develop the ability to use or not use a given function at will.