Obstacles

Obstacles

From 'A Question of Presence", by Sergio Antonio

Recently someone asked me if, once we start to experience self-remembering, there are forces that actively hinder us.

I suppose he observed intervals of increasing difficulty, or found himself more negative than usual. Or perhaps simply began to feel that the task is more difficult than he thought. Or he wondered if there are external, adverse forces in the universe that militate against spiritual development.

One element to consider is that, as soon as we have an aim (first force), it will necessarily encounter denying force. This concept is to be taken very simply. If I want to lose twenty pounds, Grandma's tasty lasagna, which she always serves in vast quantities, becomes a denying force. It wasn't before. Good and evil are relative to aim. Each new aim generates new evils.

Another aspect is that every attempt to remember oneself is accompanied by increased self-observation. We perceive more clearly and more frequently the obstacles within us. It’s not uncommon that, some time after beginning school work, we feel that we have gotten worse. The truth is we simply see more.

Finally, it’s true that when one begins to remember oneself there are forces that oppose one. Only, these forces are not external, but within us.

The instinctive center, for example, does not understand why our machine has to spend time and energy on spiritual matters, not related to survival or well-being. It will say: “I don't have time, resources, money, it's not worth it, it's impossible, I don't feel well, I'm not capable, it doesn't work, you see! I'm more negative than before,” and so on. The stronger our ability to be present becomes, the stronger this part becomes, too, always inventing new tricks. This is the “enemy within the gates.” It may seem unreal that one part of us wants something, while another part wants exactly the opposite. Yet, a person who observes will conclude that this is exactly how it is, and it can only be so; one part necessarily grows at the expense of the other.

It’s important to identify whom we can trust in ourselves. Is it the many ‘I's, which can be evoked by random stimuli? The centers, each with its own interests that it pursues at all costs, trying to steal space from the others? The queens of centers, which desire something and then, as soon as they get it, want something else (they are born to desire, and satisfaction does not satisfy them at all; it is the act of desiring that interests them)? Or this new state, this curious feeling of I am here, which I'm beginning to experience from time to time (still not very expertly and confidently), which rather resembles a newborn child facing the world?

In the Egyptian fresco, a man is passively dragged by a bull (representing the lower self); the lower leads the higher. Note the two red dots in the bull’s body: in both Eastern and Western representations, when the hero is fighting a dragon, an ogre, a monster, a snake, and so on, often it is these two points that are blocked or injured.

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Image: “Detail of Ceiling Painting.” Burial chamber of Seti I, Western Thebes, Valley of the Kings, 19th dynasty, c. 1280 B.C.