A talk by Belsebuub in California, 2009
Marriage forms the foundation of family life, it’s the foundation of personal transformation and the esoteric work. It’s where alchemy is practiced, in which the transformation required in real spirituality takes place.
It has been said that a couple should ideally be together in all the planes of cosmic existence, that they should be in complete harmony in thought, feeling, and will. That sounds ideal, but what’s more likely is usually quite different—as it has been put, “For one devil, another devil.” These are two very different viewpoints, the ideal and a more common reality.
Many seek perfection in their partner. This kind of perfection doesn’t exist. Human beings are imperfect and make many mistakes. Those who attempt to do this work try to change from an ego filled person into a spiritual being.
When a relationship begins, the couple are full of all kinds of egos, and their wills pull in many different directions. Marriage in a spiritual sense serves an extra purpose, its primary purpose is not the reproduction of the species, as in ordinary life, but it is inner transformation, and so a couple has the opportunity to grow and develop together, in a much more profound way.
Marriage creates many opportunities for learning, as in a developing relationship things are far from perfect, and all kinds of conflicts arise.
Within a relationship the redeeming factor is love. A relationship without love is empty, and love is indefinable in words—it is felt. For the moments that it’s there it may not even be recognized by the mind. Sometimes, it’s only by looking back that it can be seen, but it’s an essential quality in any marriage.
In a spiritual relationship, the commitment to the esoteric work is of utmost importance. Love is fundamental, but without the commitment to the work, a couple won’t fundamentally change and will stay more or less the same. As time goes by, arguments, drives and desires can tear them apart, or they can perhaps settle into a comfortable, loving but unchanging family environment. Whereas in a spiritual marriage, there is a revolution taking place, bringing positive change and a transformation within each person.
Marriage requires work in the long term; to individually change, to be able to accept each other’s faults, and to live in harmony. If you are a source of negativity in your own home, then you’ll create a living hell, a little inferno that you’ll spend your time wallowing in. With a couple that practices alchemy, each has the responsibility to work inwardly upon themselves in order to change, to make life easier for the other and to develop a loving and a caring environment. It is especially important since the alchemical marriage is the foundation of one’s inner work.
It takes time, sacrifice and learning to make a relationship work and last. Many who fall in love believe that a wonderful life awaits them from then on. But for a marriage to serve the spirit, it should be embarked upon with great care, with a lot of inner asking and with guidance from divinity if that’s possible.
In a relationship where two people are working inwardly and changing, an inner revolution can take place. Transformation becomes possible, and a course can be set for profound spirituality.
Q: You spoke about loving your partner on the seven cosmic planes, and I just wanted to ask you about what it really entails, what it really means to do that, and what it really takes?
Belsebuub: To love your partner on the seven cosmic planes means that within both, the inner solar bodies have been created in each of the planes and dimensions, so that the relevant spiritual parts can connect in each of the planes and dimensions. Then spirit meets spirit, soul meets soul, and they love with affinity in thought, feeling, and will (will being spiritual and sixth dimensional).
When people get together through lust and affinity alone then desires can destroy or override spiritual affinity, especially if there is no work and no inner change, the ability to change and to love is vital in a lasting relationship that serves the spirit.
It’s easy to follow an illusion thinking that you have to find a perfect partner. Yet an alchemical marriage starts with two people full of problems, worries, drives and desires, and from there they transform themselves.
Can you imagine two very spiritual beings where a wife is cooking lunch wrongly, and her husband comments on it clearly and objectively and she replies in a like manner, correcting the mistake. Imagine how different it would be compared to the angry exchanges that go on so often between couples. And imagine that wisdom multiplied throughout daily life, throughout each moment of the day. You can get an idea of what it could be like.
How different it would be in homes if people really changed, if there weren’t those little reactions that trigger off such negativity in them. As you point out, there’s more to the reactions than meets the eye, there’s a lot going on inside—there’s often a lot of anger and pride within, resentment builds up, and negativity and problems keep reappearing.
And that’s where the inner work comes in, where you dig in deep and see all this, bring it to light, deal with it, and then change. Eventually, when the same thing happens again, for example, if lunch is cooked in the same poor old way, and a comment is made about it that didn’t come from negativity and a response that comes back not from negativity, then it’s quite different, it’s a much better way of living.
It’s something to work toward.
Yes, and you can imagine this multiplied throughout the world—it would be impossible to do it as most people don’t want it—but if it was and people really changed, what a different world this would be.
I’ve noticed this really hidden dark side to the relationship, like there seems to be this lust for power or just lust in general. It seems like that’s the basis of everything in whatever form it’s coming through. So, I really want to get rid of that, and I feel at times I really move forward, but it’s like I always have two sides. How do I get rid of that other side?
Keep going and keep changing, sometimes the change is so small you don’t even see it, but it happens. Keep moving, improving, and do the three essential parts of the work properly, and then the changes take place.
There is a dark side to each person, formed from the subconscious, the egos, this is the dark side of the psychological moon. Each ego has its own agenda, and they manipulate and drive each person. In relationships, a key factor is usually lust, it can propel the whole relationship, bring people together and keep them together for a while, but it can also rip people apart.
When someone’s done their job in nature, when they’ve reproduced and brought up children, or are at the age where they could have, then they’re disposed of by nature. Another generation comes up, is gripped by the same drives and desires, and keeps the process of reproduction going.
This spiritual work uses what nature has given and from it comes the ability to transcend nature. Within this process is the destruction of the egos, of the subconscious, replacing it with consciousness and building spiritual parts within, so that the inner revolution takes place. But the negativity from the subconscious is undeniably there, and you need to go right into it, explore it, dig it up, root it out, face it, and acknowledge it. That needs to be done to begin to change, it has to be faced.
If we are really working on ourselves and disintegrating egos, can we build this communion and affinity on all these levels with basically whatever partner we have, or, does it have some boundary that’s defined by, let’s say our level of being that we can only achieve this deeper communion with kind of like beings that are more like similar to us or on our level in these higher dimensions or something like that? Can you form this union with whoever?
In embarking upon a relationship it’s very important to ask for guidance and help. And then, work on it, so that the egos are reduced and love increases—and love then brings its own affinity.
There should be a willingness to change, but there must be love. Egos can shatter love and relationships, they can create a loss of affinity, or they can also bring affinity, and affinity based on egos is not really conducive in the long run for the inner work. What is conducive in the long run for the esoteric work is love.
What if someone has personal problems in their family life and it’s blocking their efforts to concentrate because they’re always thinking about those problems?
They need to do what they can to deal with the problems and their emotional responses to them. If they want to be quiet, in a practice of meditation for example, or want to do something without worrying about their problems, they should realize that if they are not in the presence of the situation, or in a time they have to deal with them, then if they stop thinking about them, the problems psychologically disappear in that moment.
In situations like that, it’s a problem of the mind, sustained and pushed by the egos, the problems can be dealt with later in their own time.
However, emotions can sometimes be too great to go away in a moment and that means the problems need to be dealt with in life as thoroughly as possible, as do the emotional responses to them.
It’s different if someone has a physical illness however, then the pain or discomfort of that physical illness can keep the mind on it and can hinder the effectiveness of a practice.
I found myself in a situation in my marriage where I discovered this very big monster inside of me and I saw that this was blocking me loving my wife more. And I was shocked by it, and I didn’t know what to do, because I thought that I didn’t have the tools to go and research it and see what that is.
The tools are there to deal with it, and although it may seem as though the egos won’t change, they can change with these tools, practices, and exercises.
You must face what’s inside you; what’s inside of you is going to come out at some stage, it’s going to appear. If you’re working upon yourself it’s not just going to stay stuck in the subconscious. The varied circumstances of life and relationships will bring it out. And relationships are really good for bringing out all the rottenness that’s inside. Then, you can apply the tools to see, to understand, and remove the rottenness that’s inside.
Without tackling that point, without getting into the subconscious, into the rottenness, you can mask it over, you can try to pretend that it doesn’t exist, but at some point it’s going to come up, you’re going to have to face it, and other people are going to suffer from the consequences of what’s within you.
Although the tools are there, it’s another thing to use them. You can have the tools and not really make use of them; you can just treat them lightly. But change of a fundamental kind doesn’t happen when you take the practices lightly; it only comes when you thoroughly do the exercises and practices, when you thoroughly use the tools and use them well.
That takes practice—keep practicing them so that you learn how they work and then learn how to use them, and as you do, you’ll eventually apply them better. As your use of the tools improves, you are able to improve yourself more, and bring about change which helps your relationship.
