An Old Gray Head's Advice

An Old Gray Head's Advice
| Jim Woolsey a.k.a. Philalethes

"By accident" I found the following [talk by Fred Hess] while rummaging around in my Vitvan files. I found it to be very appropriate. It shows how nothing much has changed at SNO over the decades. There are those who break on through, while the majority mentalize. In it he mentions Reichean body work. Back in the 70s I cried in Dr. John Gozzi's ear that unlike so many others who spoke glowingly of moving experiences while meditating with Anita, I felt I was a dud; I couldn't feel much at all. He confided in me that even after sitting at Vitvan's feet or 20 years, basking in his Darshan, he too felt he was a dud. It was only after taking a more proactive stance in his development, and undergoing years of Reichean therapy that he broke through into feeling the energy flows. I followed his advice to work with Dr. Regardie, and I also broke through in this way. Fred Hess was another of those overly mental types who also needed more than the diffused Darshan effect to break through.

Vic Weese also did Reichian bodywork with Dr. Gozzi, but it wasn't enough to break through the iron band that compresses his chest. Only after I reintroduced him to the medicines was he able to begin to bring this barrier back up into awareness of its existence. It remains to be seen if he will follow through exploring this bottled up anguish; so far the answer seems to be No.

It is very telling that Pat Murray, now elected (figurehead) president of SNO 2013, once went to Dr. John Gozzi for a bodywork session, and the emotional release so scared him he ran home and cried for two weeks. Pat has never followed through on this minor opening into his Purificatory Process on Level II. He seems to have an unspoken contract with his highly neurotic wife, Jane, to live a bourgeois life and for neither to [go] further into the real Work.

The other die hards at SNO, Marj Coffman, Lynne Hoffman, and Susan Wetmore continue to live in a bubble of the False Light, never seriously or proactively seeking to push themselves into Level II work on their own psyches. The "urge" which Fred Hess talks of below, has not been born in them yet, and they putter around on Level I, the descriptive objectified level. They cannot feel the suffocating atmosphere they produce at Home Farm. They prattle of "Love" in their newsletter, as the real students leave the school.

I make no secret that the attitude "life is my teacher" is not enough. One who has to know, who has the Urge as Fred says, will do whatever it takes to crack the veil. Strong Medicine is a gift to us from the Blessed Ones. (August 22, 2011, updated December 2013).

~

FOOD FOR THOUGHT

On a recent Sunday in July Fred Hess presented a talk which gathered together his observations and perceptions concerning the functioning of the School over a period of many years. His opinions were spelled out in a carefully prepared talk and seemed important enough to share with a larger audience. Not everyone agrees with Fred, or his observations of the School. Opinions totally opposed to his are expressed often by students living here as well as by visitors. But in the interest of airing some controversial issues we decided to present his talk as a contribution to the Journal. I think you will agree that it is clearly stated and also thought-provoking. (Jim Dalton, August 1979)

WHAT MAKES A STUDENT?

What makes a student? Is there any need for a student to be highly educated? Does the Light turn away persons who haven't finished high school? Does the Light fawn over persons with Ph.D's? How about a person who sees auras and registers frequencies? Why do some apparently promising people come to a place like our beloved School and go away unchanged, when others whom we may not even want to welcome come in and stick? To me there is only one activity in the consciousness of any person that makes that one a student, and I describe that activity with the little word "urge".

What is the referent for that word "urge"? The Power-to-be conscious directly influencing the consciousness of an individual through internal motivations. These are the same words we use for our referent for the word telokinesis (as Vitvan described in the Beginners Course lectures.) URGE! The Power-to-be-conscious pushing you! "Seek! Find! Learn of Me!" And what do we do? How do we respond to that push? Well, in the beginning we justify.

For many years I gave a lot of value to the word student. For my first ten years in the School I referred to myself as a member of the School of the Natural Order. I knew I didn't do the exercises; I knew I didn't sustain any effort. I sagged on the ropes. And I let whoever would carry me, carry me. And they did. So how could I call myself a student?

Oh, I went through the two-week flurrys that Vitvan often referred to, and that, more than ever, pin-pointed me as a member. I didn't even have enough personal pride to try to get off the ropes and stand on my own two feet. But one day the urge (Remember the referent for the "urge" is the Power-to-be-conscious exerting its influence.) said, "Start." And I started.

What it really said was, "I am here. Start." But I wasn't conscious of the "I am here" part for many years. Then I felt free to think of myself as a student. (Please pardon the use of a personal reference to make a point.)

What do we here in the School of the Natural Order have to offer a genuine student?

1] First and foremost we offer a roadmap. This much I know - love is not enough! Pure love is the devotional path to the Light. In the Hindu teachings it is called Shakti Yoga. If it were enough the Hindus would not have needed Jnana Yoga, the mental path to the Light. And if those two, separately, had been enough, they would not have developed Raja Yoga, the royal yoga, the devotional faculty and the mental faculty working together. This represents the primary method for development as given here in the School of the Natural Order. Later other faculties will develop which allows our yoga to be qualified by a different adjective.

Love is not enough. Those of you who've been there, you know it. Those of you who haven't, be patient. You'll know it.

The classroom in San Marcos had a long blackboard and over it was a sign saying, "With all thy getting, get understanding. Proverbs 4.7" This work emphasizes understanding.

Another way that Vitvan stated it was on the inside cover to the Here-Now: "Faith, Love, Knowledge, as powerful cosmic forces, represent the way to Wisdom." My referent for Wisdom is the Power-to-be-conscious, identified with itself, functioning in Light substance.

Love is born out of many experiences in faith. (Have you experienced that? Have you ever consciously recognized that?) But love doesn't get you the rest of the way. Next comes mental understanding - our roadmap - and then it (the results of experiences in love) becomes built into your vehicle as structure, and then we call it knowledge. All else is epistemology, book learning, etc.

Love is not enough. Get your roadmap, so you can have stability. Get your roadmap, so you can recognize epistemology for what it is. I'm talking to you older students, too. Some of the verbalizing I've heard over the years I call a disgrace to the legacy Vitvan left us. So take two years to get, or improve, your roadmap. Love is not enough.

2] The second offering that we have for a student is purification - purification in a chemical sense, not a moral sense. How many incarnations have we indulged and over-indulged ourselves in activities which were natural to our state at one time, but which no longer are appropriate? These over-indulgences created conditions and entities in our psyches and we died carrying those affinities with us. When we re-incarnated we brought the affinities with us and soaked up the entities right out of the race-psyche. How can we enter Light's Regions with an unclean psyche? It is said that even releasing the Kundalini (the sleeping force at the base of the spine) into an unpurified psyche produces madness in the extreme. Thus we offer freedom - freedom from our old self-indulgences via purification. And in those purifying experiences we develop a new faculty, discrimination, the ability to tell before you get into something, some activity, whether it is true to your state or not. One of the quickest ways to tell how far a young soul is along the path is by looking for the faculty of discrimination displayed in his/her actions.

3] What else do we have to offer a genuine student? Steps on the path. In one word: Exercises. Breathing, concentration exercises, et cetera. Incidentally, if and when this genuine student succeeds in abstracting consciously to the first order, when he or she consciously differentiates between the event and the image in the psyche, the rest of the abstracting process pales into insignificant verbalization. I refer you to the literature for descriptions of the various exercises.

4] Fourth, we offer Darshan to students in our School. What is the referent? Darshan is a Sanskrit term referred to on page 8 in The Christos. The term refers to the radiance of one who has gone through the purificatory process to be able to stand in the higher power of Light and reflected Light. I include the term reflected light because I know from experience that the radiance of one who has not even been inducted into the inner orders can be a blessing to one in difficulty. It's the radiance, the quickening power that we call Darshan, but it's the effect upon us that is our blessing. So, those who think that Darshan went out when Vitvan checked out may need a few more husks before their pride is humbled.

5] We have one more thing to offer a real and genuine student. And I would like to hand it to you on the most beautiful silver tray you can imagine. But first, I owe some of you an apology. We older students have a club - not a clubby group, but a heavy club, with a spike in it. And we use it on the younger students. It starts like this, "When I was with Vitvan...," or, "Vitvan said to me...," or, "When Vitvan and I were doing so and so together..." And I expect you to be in awe of my great erudition. Please forgive me!

May I make amends? May I offer you a consciousness of Vitvan? May I offer you Vitvan himself? How many times have I heard, "Gee, I wish I'd known Vitvan?" I've told you before, he's "alive and well and living in heaven." His field is our group field. So I say this: Introduce yourself to him. Meet him in the frequencies. You won't regret it; you surely won't forget it. And if you're afraid, then do it this way. Sit quietly and say, "Vitvan, Vitvan, Vitvan, Fred says I should get
acquainted with you." And if you shouldn't, then I'll be the guy who reaps the karma! Now, I'm not saying to do it all the time, maybe once every year or two. And I'm sure not saying use him as a leaning post. But do it once and keep trying until you succeed. And then the next time I try to pull that "Vitvan and me" stuff on you, you can look me in the eye and say, "Fred, piss on you.”

Do you think I'm just talking to you younger students? I am not. How long has it been since you older students have registered Vitvan? Too long, I'll bet. Try it. Do it. And then you won't have to cling to a memory of Vitvan as the high point of your experience in the School. All of you experience it. Experience it and then ruminate on it until you realize that there is no gulf between his world and our world. It's the same world we function in. Our only blockage is our images - "my body is a thing." I can't offer you a greater gift.

So now I've set up the referent for a student. I've listed the things our School has to offer a student. Now let's see where we are. Where is we?

The School today seems predominantly composed of two groups, those who joined in the 50s (I wish more of them were present), and those who joined in the 70s. I'd like to talk for a moment about the first group since, by definition, I'm part of it. When we joined the School in the 50s Vitvan was giving his finest work. We dug ditches and laid water lines and cleaned out springs and we knew that Light's Regions was not far off. We could see a school for children configurating. We could see the foundation for a metropolis called New Alexandria configurating. What if there were a couple of false starts before we got to Nevada? What if it was a "tough fight with a short stick?" It was all opening up for us. Vitvan had a loyal bunch of what he called "grey heads" that we younger ones learned to go to for answers: Connia deBit for gardening, Alice Moffat for school history, Lu Bacon, Agni Truax and, not the least, Mabel Hayden. We didn't want to pester Vitvan for everything.

So twenty years went by and what happened? Nothing. We had forgotten to sustain our exercises. We were just 20 years older. And Vitvan had checked out - deserted us, some felt. We hadn't become Fourth Degree Initiates, not even brothers of the Third Degree. We just talked, like you do today.

But one significant event did occur in the late 50s. As Vitvan stated it, "Mabel Hayden died." After 25 years in the work, Mabel Hayden purified her vehicles, lifted her forces, brought in and sustained function in a new level of force and thereby became qualified to carry on with the work which Vitvan had begun.

Now let me address the older students. We do not feel guilty or ashamed of anything. Maybe we didn't configurate a New Alexandria. Only those who were there know how low we sank in spirit after Vitvan left and how we scratched to hold the School together. Of course, we should have abstracted, etc., etc., etc. But we did welcome the youngsters who started coming in because Vitvan had said the New Age children would be more highly developed. And we watched them screw around and swill beer until we didn't want to see another New Age child on the place!

But we did one thing - we stuck. We supported Anita and we held. Everyone supported in his or her way. And if we're still developing our egos, we take pride in that. But there is still a place for us. Even as we went to the older students for information and stability, we now have the opportunity to provide information and stability ourselves. The newer students today need more than one to look to and we can fill that function to the degree that we can claim their respect.

Remember, Vitvan said the new cycle started in 1885 and the old cycle ended in 1945, that it would take 100 years, or three generations for the new cycle to take hold. The first generation has come and here they sit. And some of the next generation has been born already.

So now, New Age children, I'm talking to you. You now have some idea of why you might not have been welcomed with open arms, why you have had to prove your trustworthiness. But I think you're doing that, and I cast my lot with you and each succeeding generation. I've registered Vitvan in the frequencies enough to know that I don't have to cling to a memory of him. That is why I'm so desirous that all and each of you share that registry with me. Then we can stand in the here-now with him, just as some of us did in past years.

Self-development is not easy. Just fulfilling one's natural order state is not easy. And getting started on finding one's natural order state is hardest of all. So, how does one get started? The School offers two methods, and I'm going to add a third. The first method is exercises. I have never seen anyone make any grade with the exercises alone. They are designed to develop self-discipline, but it takes self-discipline at the outset to do them. It's a circle with no apparent starting point, just like every other circle. Perhaps self-disciplined students have no need for a school. In 1954 I asked Vitvan, "How long would it take to make the first crossing?" He replied, "Six weeks - provided one could concentrate." So I asked, "How long would it take to learn to concentrate?" And he answered, "Ninety days." How's that for a plum?

The next method is passive. Get Darshan! Find someone whose radiance can help you through the purificatory process and get in it and stay in it, or get in it as often as you can. And let it work! That's all, just cooperate with it. You know what cooperating with it means. When something makes you react, it's the Darshan that's working and you have to recognize that fact and help that which has come to the surface be released from your state.

The third method I want to introduce is a series of breathing exercises designed to produce a state of controlled hyperventilation. I've seen what it can do and I'll say that as far as self-development is concerned it's only a starter, but it will break the periphery of the exercise circle for you and give you the self-confidence to continue. Unfortunately, it requires a therapist because it goes by the name of Reichian therapy. But I believe it is so valuable to one who cannot stand in Darshan that I've said, once you've got your road map, find a therapist and go get a job where he lives and live there the four or five years it takes to finish that process and then start your self-development.

This roadmap business is so important. Partly for inner harmony, partly for group harmony. The ones without roadmaps sit around and criticize - the ones who are new sit around and criticize other newcomers; the ones who have been here awhile criticize whomever they choose to react to. And John Gozzi and I are getting tired of playing the role of peacemaker for those who refuse to do their homework.

To me, there is one series of talks Vitvan gave which, if all the local students sat in on all the lessons, would reduce the criticizing and carping 50%, maybe even criticism relative to the school leadership. Unfortunately, most of the tapes are incomplete, but there is a complete manuscript of The Seven Initiations, including the Seven Rays of Development. Putting the tapes and the manuscript together to make complete lessons will explain many things, except to those who have chosen to blind themselves.

These lessons will also explain, I hope, why I believe there must be one leader who can sustain function on some level other than the personal level. No one below can contact and hold the focus of the field. Some people here think that government by committee will work. But there is another factor. You have heard the quotation, "Where two or more are gathered in my name, there am I." But I'm going to add, "in a very diluted form." Why? For this reason - (and this is my roadmap): Nowhere in the worlds of reality is there any resistance to the will of God (the Power-to-be-conscious) except on the human level. Every Being from a Lord of the Flame down to the tiniest flower fairy responds instantly to the will of the Power. So any group that assembles in the name of the Power elicits a response from the heaven worlds, but only to the degree of purification of the members of the group! It would be a violation of individual integrity for a Christed one to come in with the power of his radiance and precipitate the purificatory process in those assembled in an unpurified group. Therefore, the guidance is diluted, the Darshan is gone and we have no direct contact with the power of the field and I say that is an unacceptable way to carry on the configurational activities of this School, of this field.

Believe me, if we are left without a successor to Anita, my roadmap says the Higher Ones have abandoned the School and I should check the outfit out, no matter how much or for how long Home Farm thrives as a farm, or a center for literature distribution.

Furthermore, in those lessons (The Seven Initiations) it is said that the nearest thing, on the objective level, to hierarchical structure is a corporation. Anyone familiar with corporate life knows that committees do not exist there. Everything is delegated to people of proven competence.

So, let's put some of this together. First, we have a bunch of students who have recently contacted Vitvan (meaning you) and, therefore, have new faith in him. And we also have a process whereby one, someone, can contact, hold, and radiate the power of the field for the members thereof to function under, and in.

So! Can we not hold the idea that Vitvan knows that we will need someone of that state to carry on after Anita, and can we not have faith in his seeing to it that we are not left without such a one? And more important than that, can we not get our roadmaps together so we can see just how important it is?

What makes a student? Do you really have the urge? (Fred Hess, August 1979)