A talk by Belsebuub in Greece, 2006
Within a few is the feeling of wanting to search for something spiritual. That wanting feeling though is usually small, and is very easy to lose in all the different things that go on in life.
There are so many concerns, so many things to be occupied with, that it’s very easy to forget about spiritual awakening. Although you might occasionally try to do something about the yearning, it all too often gets buried. And before you know it, time passes by, and you’ve really wasted your opportunity.
If you want something spiritually, you have to be active and do things for it to manifest within you, such as carrying out spiritual exercises and practices. When you do them however, you may find that you don’t always feel like practicing, perhaps not even for most of the time. So how are you going to awaken if you don’t feel like practicing most of the time?
The answer really is that you have to practice whether you like it or not. If you wish to take advantage of that little spark inside that wants to awaken, if you want to listen to it, you need to put something into action, you have to go against the whole inertia, against the full weight of the egos, and the whole of life which wants to take you in a different direction—you’ve got to battle against all of this.
If you just practice whenever you feel like it, you’ll only do a small amount, and that won’t be enough to be able to rise up, to awaken spiritually. The only way therefore is to overcome the resistance by making yourself practice and do things that benefit the spiritual, whether you feel like doing them or not. If you don’t then the resistance will have overcome you.
Sometimes your conscience will nag you, and make you feel guilty when you’re not doing something that you should be doing, and it’s important to listen to this, because it’s a little spiritual voice that’s crying out, a voice which is the real you, which is lost and which is smothered in all the illusion of the egos, and in a kind of an illusory life that just leads to an unknown death. So it is vital to be able to make the sacrifices that are needed for enlightenment.
To awaken, you have to take one step at a time. The path to enlightenment has lots of different steps, it goes in stages, and you have to be prepared to take the next stage. You can’t start at the beginning and then jump to the end. At any one point, you’re at a certain stage with a defect of one kind or another, with things you need to overcome, then you can decide to walk forward and take a step.
You have to take the first step or the next step, depending on what you’ve done, and then move on to the next. One step may not be so difficult, but you have to take that step to be able to go all the way. To advance, you have to take a blind step in the right direction—one step, that’s all.
To make the next step is to advance a little bit, you move and before you know it, you pass tests. Some people come to talks and after not very long, they’ve passed a few tests—very basic one’s, not on the first mountain, just the ones you get when starting off. Those people left after a short time, so there’s no reason why anyone with an essence couldn’t take those steps, as long as they can overcome the Guardian of the Threshold, which is how you face your own egos in the beginning. If you run away from your egos and don’t want to face them, you’ll leave the esoteric work eventually. It’s a really basic test as to whether you are going to fight against your egos or not.
This is what your facing, it’s not all distant from your life; it is what each person is facing right now. Everyone who has an essence is in this school of life, and is going to get tested, everyone past a certain age faces tests—no-one is free of it. Don’t think that you have to do a huge, distant work before you even get into the preparation that leads to the path; pass the Guardian of the Threshold, which is very basic, and you’re in it.
Q: When do we get thrown the esoteric tests and who throws them?
Belsebuub: There are higher beings in the higher dimensions who are allocated to that very task, like teachers in a school, they watch what each person is doing. They see whether they are ready, and if they are, they will throw them a test. In the case of the test of the Guardian of the Threshold, they will throw the test when the person has had sufficient opportunity to prepare themselves.
It all depends on you. Just as there are exams here, there are exams there as well. They assess how everyone is doing—the criteria they use to make and judge for the tests is the same for all. No one can change their criteria to make it easier or more difficult, it’s what has to be done to fulfill their requirements.
Why do some people have the drive to take up the spiritual path?
That’s due to the strength of the Being. But in this ‘Dark Age’ a lot of people have the capacity to do this work, and the Being is pushing them to do it. The problem though is that they don’t do what the Being wants them to do. The Being could be strong, but they are just too lazy, with lots of excuses. And the problem too is that the essence is passive by nature, and depends upon an individual’s activity. As more parts of the Being incarnate, then there are more active parts that help.
But when you start out, the essence is passive and it depends on the whole of the psyche. You may feel that you should be practicing, which can be the Being pushing you to work upon yourself, but you may decide to watch television instead; it depends on whether the strength of the Being is put to use or whether egos are fed and direct your actions instead. Some Beings are more mystical than others, some are more direct and have a lot of strength, but either way, if you’re here studying the esoteric work, it’s likely that it’s because your Being is pushing you to awaken.
How do we know whether something that is taking place in our lives is due to the tests of the path, or if it’s something we brought about ourselves by our egos?
To get the right direction to know whether what’s happening is due to tests or egos, you need to be aware of information from the other side in the form of out-of-body experiences or dreams to know if you have already passed something, which shows you where you are on the path. When you know what’s next on the path you can look at the teachings to see what kind of test that brings.
If you’re practicing fully and helping other people you begin to become in line with the divine law. Until you advance on the path it’s very difficult to know whether what’s coming as an event in your life is a consequence of your immediate actions, or a test, whether it’s a result of something karmic, or whether it’s the result of an accident which is working itself out. It’s normal to be unclear about this in the beginning; it’s all part of the learning stage.
As the path progresses karma is paid off and the events of life become increasingly due to the path and less due to karma, until eventually all karma is paid and the events in life that would be due to it cease. Tests become a way to pay karma too as the suffering they bring is used as karmic payment. Even practicing alchemy pays karma.
In the beginning, before the path begins, what is happening in daily life is not due to the events of the path, but are in the cycle of cause and effect which are in motion in life.
That cycle is also used for learning, so for example, if you go to work and you have an angry unfair boss, you may normally be reacting negatively to that person, but you can’t say anything because it’s your boss. In this case you can get something valuable for yourself out of the event by observing and dying to your egos. That event then becomes used for your inner progress, and at the right time, can also be used for testing on the path. This is not to say that should opportunities arise to change circumstances, that they shouldn’t be taken or made, its referring to the psychological response to circumstances.
The further someone goes on the path, the more they get in line with the divine will and law, and the more the events of life are of the path.
What egos do we need to overcome to be able to pass the Guardian of the Threshold? Would fear be an example?
The Guardian of the Threshold is not connected to any one specific ego, so it wouldn’t be connected to fear. The Guardian is the sum of the egos; it is the beast each person has created. It’s not any one particular thought or feeling.
If you generally face your egos, then at the appropriate time, you’ll face the Guardian, once you have been given sufficient opportunity to take up the work. The way that you face it has nothing to do with not being afraid of monsters in a dream, but it works in relation to the way that you face your egos here—it has a precise correlation. The way that you face your egos here is how you relate to that monster there. It’s to do with what you do inwardly here. If you’re having a good attempt at tackling your egos and are not afraid of them here, then you are not afraid of the monster over there and you defeat the beast.
Is there a way to know whether we’ve passed the test of the Guardian?
Yes, if you see it in your dreams then you’ll know. The consciousness a person has in daily life is awakened for the tests (without the ability to know where you are), and so you are much more likely to remember it than you would an ordinary dream; it may nevertheless be possible to miss it, so that can be a real problem. It’s a pity if you’ve gone through all this and the big moment arrives, you’re victorious, then the alarm clock rings, you’re late for work, you get up and run, and don’t remember the dream at all.
This is one of the reasons why it’s important to remember dreams in the morning as soon as you wake up. This is relevant to where you are right now. It’s part of your life, it’s not a distant thing, it’s happening right now.
How aware are we when the tests are being thrown?
The consciousness that is active in daily life is awakened for every single test that’s thrown over there, but in such a way that you don’t ever realize that it’s a dream, or that it’s the astral world, or that it’s a test. So whatever consciousness you’ve got here, that’s the consciousness with which things there are faced. And that is also why they can be remembered quite well, they don’t tend to be buried in the subconscious like many ordinary dreams, because the consciousness is awakened, but without the ability of self-reflection. So even if you’ve been trying for a while and you can’t remember anything, just keep going—if any dream appears, you’ll find it easier to remember the next one.
Can these tests of the path happen for everyone?
Yes, these teachings describe what happens; these things have existed throughout the history of humanity. If someone is achieving some strength over their egos, then it starts. It’s a pity that amongst humanity few generally ever achieve it.
If you pass these early stages, does it give you the strength to continue?
Yes, if you go through the probative path it does give you strength to go on because you’ve gone through something tangible and gained its rewards. If you’ve started the first mountain you’ve awakened the Kundalini, so that’s a significant gain. But taking the next step gives you strength to go on. Whatever that is, it’s significant; just keep going after that.
As I begin to look at myself I feel disappointed and demoralized at the way I am.
When you look at yourself sincerely, you’ll see that you are worse than you thought, because you’ve got all sorts of ideas about yourself, as everyone does. Then disappointment and sometimes denial follow, and you can be appalled at yourself. But, this is an essential part of awakening—how would you move forward or progress if you think you’re great? You couldn’t, because you wouldn’t want to work on yourself, you wouldn’t want to get rid of your egos.
As you discover the existence of new egos inside, you then begin to see more. And then you find that you’re dramatically worse than you thought you were. This could make you distraught and very upset, but this is all part of awakening. In many old Christian texts people repent very sincerely, and after they repent, they change. This repentance is absolutely essential. You even go through crises, which are really hard, and yet those crises are necessary.
You don’t step from one bed of roses to the next; you go through one difficulty to the next. But, with the difference being that in normal life, the difficulties just happen usually according to karmic laws, but in the path, you get spiritual inner rewards.
You can choose to put yourself through this work—you don’t have to face the egos, you can just do nothing spiritual with your life if you want to. But if you have the courage and meet the requirements set by divinity, you triumph spiritually.
Divine beings use the events of life, put people through difficulties and crises, so that understanding can be found, obstacles overcome, and initiation attained.
It’s sometimes in the darkest moments that the most deep and sincere understanding is found. When things are going really well, self-deceit flourishes. But when difficulties rise up against you, all kinds of terrible inner states come up, which gives you the opportunity to understand them.
It’s inevitable that difficulties are always faced before every spiritual reward. Ordinary life is full of difficulties, but on the path they lead to spiritual rewards.
What happens to us here if we are advanced along the path, say on the second mountain and we fall?
Anyone who falls from the second mountain and leaves the work would be left with an awful feeling of remorse; they’ve just lost everything. Judas represented the betrayal of the Christ when he exchanged the Christ for thirty pieces of silver, which is nothing of true value, an emptiness exchanged for the Christ.
Having gone through much of the path and fallen, you can’t be like an ordinary person anymore, and yet you can’t be spiritual either, not with all the knowledge and wisdom that you’ve gained and all the experiences you’ve had. You’ve got nowhere to go; you’re alone in life. And that’s represented by Judas hanging from a tree: he’s got a branch above his head, so his head’s not in the heavens, and his feet are not touching the ground, which is ordinary life, and he’s in a terrible situation—it couldn’t be worse.
But can’t they try again and pick up where they left off?
It can be too difficult to regain that again, the karma is great, and they can be thrown out of the path completely. Someone would have to have to have a greater level of understanding than they had before, and that’s not easy, because when things slip to that kind of level, it’s harder to claw them back, they become isolated and the Being withdraws its strength. It’s very difficult to claw back into it and carry on.
If the fall is involuntary, or a temporary weakness, they’ve got to keep going even though it’s difficult. But if a person could lose the path because of a difficult test, then the divine beings don’t even throw the test, they wait until they think someone’s prepared, they check over there first before things happen here, as it takes a lot to move all the events in life. Lots of people and circumstances can be involved.
But if you’re just starting out and you’ve gone a bit weak, don’t give up. Apply the same principle: carry on. Unless you throw in the towel and just go and join those who don’t want to awaken, you’ll go through difficulties, but carry on. Sometimes when things are at their worst is when the light is about to shine, that’s when you succeed. When it seems as though everything is hopeless just carry on, hang on and you’ll just make it. What you need to do is to pray and persist.
