In Search of the Miraculous

"The fourth state of consciousness in man means an altogether different state of

being; it is the result of inner growth and of long and difficult work on oneself.

"But the third state of consciousness constitutes the natural right of man as he is, and if man does not possess it, it is only because of the wrong conditions of his life. It can be said without any exaggeration that at the present time the third state of

consciousness occurs in man only in the form of very rare flashes and that it can be

made more or less permanent in him only by means of special training.

"For most people, even for educated and thinking people, the chief obstacle in the

way of acquiring self-consciousness consists in the fact that they think they possess it, that is, that they possess self-consciousness and everything connected with it;

individuality in the sense of a permanent and unchangeable I, will, ability to do, and so on. It is evident that a man will not be interested if you tell him that he can acquire by long and difficult work something which, in his opinion, he already has. On the

contrary he will think either that you are mad or that you want to deceive him with a

view to personal gain.

"The two higher states of consciousness—'self-consciousness' and 'objective

consciousness'—are connected with the functioning of the higher centers in man.

"In addition to those centers of which we have so far spoken there are two other

centers in man, the 'higher emotional' and the 'higher thinking.' These centers are in

us; they are fully developed and are working all the time, but their work fails to reach

our ordinary consciousness. The cause of this lies in the special properties of our socalled 'clear consciousness.'

"In order to understand what the difference between states of consciousness is, let

us return to the first state of consciousness which is sleep. This is an entirely

subjective state of consciousness. A man is immersed in dreams, whether he

remembers them or not does not matter. Even if some real impressions reach him,

such as sounds, voices, warmth, cold, the sensation of his own body, they arouse in

him only fantastic subjective images. Then a man wakes up. At first glance this is a

quite different state of consciousness. He can move, he can talk with other people, he

can make calculations ahead, he can see danger and avoid it, and so on. It stands to

reason that he is in a better position than when he was asleep. But if we go a little

more deeply into things, if we

take a look into his inner world, into his thoughts, into the causes of his actions, we

shall see that he is in almost the same state as when he is asleep. And it is even

worse, because in sleep he is passive, that is, he cannot do anything. In the waking

state, however, he can do something all the time and the results of all his actions will

be reflected upon him or upon those around him. And yet he does not remember

himself. He is a machine, everything with him happens. He cannot stop the flow of his thoughts, he cannot control his imagination, his emotions, his attention. He lives

in a subjective world of 'I love,' 'I do not love,' 'I like,' 'I do not like,' 'I want,' 'I do not want,' that is, of what he thinks he likes, of what he thinks he does not like, of what

he thinks he wants, of what he thinks he does not want. He does not see the real

world. The real world is hidden from him by the wall of imagination. He lives in

sleep. He is asleep. What is called 'clear consciousness' is sleep and a far more dangerous sleep than sleep at night in bed.

"Let us take some event in the life of humanity. For instance, war. There is a war

going on at the present moment. What does it signify? It signifies that several

millions of sleeping people are trying to destroy several millions of other sleeping

people. They would not do this, of course, if they were to wake up. Everything that

takes place is owing to this sleep.

"Both states of consciousness, sleep and the waking state, are equally subjective.

Only by beginning to remember himself does a man really awaken. And then all

surrounding life acquires for him a different aspect and a different meaning. He sees

that it is the life of sleeping people, a life in sleep. All that men say, all that they do, they say and do in sleep. All this can have no value whatever. Only awakening and

what leads to awakening has a value in reality.

"How many times have I been asked here whether wars can be stopped? Certainly

they can. For this it is only necessary that people should awaken. It seems a small

thing. It is, however, the most difficult thing there can be because this sleep is

induced and maintained by the whole of surrounding life, by all surrounding

conditions.

"How can one awaken? How can one escape this sleep? These questions are the

most important, the most vital that can ever confront a man. But before this it is