From the daily Steiner website:
In all the experiences I have been describing, man’s consciousness is far clearer and more awake than the ordinary consciousness of his life on Earth. It is most important to distinguish the various degrees of human consciousness. Consciousness during dream-life is dull, consciousness during waking life is clear, consciousness after death still clearer. As a dream is to reality, so is all our life on Earth in comparison with the clarity of our consciousness in the life after death. Moreover, at each new stage in the life after death, consciousness becomes still clearer, still more alert.
Source: Rudolf Steiner – GA 231 – Supersensible Man: Lecture IV – The Hague, 17th November 1923 (evening)
Translated by Mary Adams
In many ways, Steiner seems so far ahead of his time (like many of the Theosophists) … but I actually have little knowledge of the time in history which he spoke from. Personally, I have never been able to read Steiner at any length. My brain just shuts down and loses focus after a few paragraphs or pages. I guess that if I do something I want to be in a sense of flow and ease (but not necessarily easiness). So, your quote was the appropriate dosage for me, Frank (thanks)! 😉 lol
If I were sitting in his audience (however), I would be wondering, “how does he know what happens after death and the rest of do not?” This seems like him projecting a belief. While telling myself this, I am remembering the first time I saw beyond my body. My vision was more lucid and clear than physical life. There was a shiny-ness to my bedroom in the RTZ, and I could “zoom in” my vision on objects without moving away from my body. I was filled with wonder.
So, while I question a bit of Steiner’s conjecture, I agree with it based upon my non-physical experiences.
Yes, I do agree with you Subtle Traveller.
But after the seven months to have received “The Daily Quotes” from Krishnamurti`s`….Now beginning to wonder if ever “To Rely Upon the Own Experiences.”
Yesterdays headline by Krishnamurti:” Can we rely upon our experiences” ?
And came to be thinking about the sentence by Cicero(a roman philosopher long ago)….” I can see, but all I see is but me.”
Hm, well, if Seth is right about it…then we do create all we see.
Mr. President Donald Trumph likewise. But I do believe we have to consider “the unseen influences” upon us all the way. BUT what I cannot see is how it is possible …to give only ONE MAN such POWER throughout the historic perspective…and within NOWADAYS society (in the western world at least).
B & B, Inger Lise
Perhaps one good effect of Trump’s election will be to remind people who are in favor of giving the presidency more power that our founding fathers knew full well that power to do good is power to do evil, and that no man should be trusted with it. You’d have thoght the reign of Kng George the Unelected (i.e. George W. Bush) would have made the point, but some people are slow learners.
Hi Inger Lise … yeah, I understand what you are pointing to.
Certainly, rushing to a hardened belief or conclusion is not helpful. And fortunately, we get little reminders provided to us as we travel (e.g., like your Krishnamurti reminder). They often arrive just in time.
As my guidance suggested to me a while back when I was questioning my experiences, ‘we are each the captain of our mystery ship’. They started playing the 1970’s song by Blues Image in my head (“Ride Captain Ride upon your mystery ship”). I had to look the song up, but the lyrics were a perfect match to my circumstances.
Trump is whole other subject (for me), so I won’t go there at this time. Thanks for your response and connection.
I misread your reference at first, and it sent me back to The Moody Blues, and “Ride my Seesaw.” Great group, great album (though I couldn’t tell you the name of the album).
Hi Frank …
fwiw … Moody Blues was a favorite group for me growing up … and while I am slightly younger than you, I have the same kind of fuzzy memories when it comes to remembering songs from the 1970’s. (lol)
Here is the Blue’s Image song my guides responded with …
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r8lf7RLYIww
It is worth a listen. The lyrics are very encouraging (metaphorically). The album is called “Open” and was released in 1970. Info here if interested:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_(Blues_Image_album)
My music was more from the 60s, but Moody Blues was a happy exception. And Chicago, sometimes. Were The Eagles 60s or (as I sus[ect) 70s?
…having had yet another “quasi-OBE” this morning, I’m wondering (asking my Guidance) at how I can gain more lucid experiences, esp. vision, and focus? I “got back” (from y’day morning’s pre-awakening thoughts) that I’m “getting as much lucidity as (I) can handle at this stage”. What that means to me seems fairly obvious logically; that even though I have the strong desire to “prove to myself” that “I am more…”, I still have some “deep fear” issues/survivalist tendencies, which, while useful in negotiating “3D+1D” reality, are hanging me up a bit in my “extra-curricular” explorations.
I’ve been asking for help w/ this, and “keeping open” (I also get suspicious w/ “overly confident” pronouncements from others–as the co-facilitator, at the 2015 “NDE-Intensive” TMI program said to me on the final morning, “Gurus make me nervous.”) As many have said by now, we have some guideposts and rough/crude maps of the “all-D”, but each of us, in one “life-focus” can likely only “bring back” a small piece of it. As Bob Monroe reminds us, in “Ultimate Journey” (which I’ve just started re-reading), we will find proof–for ourselves only. For me, I’d add that the “proof” is “conditional, upon further testing/journeys/analysis”.
Personally, I would still like to trust my own experiences more; for me “direct experience” is the most valuable, backed up by other “travelers”, who are willing to share their experiences, which act as an encouraging “it IS possible to do this” nudge.
As for music, “Ride, Captain Ride” is an apt song; I always mentally link it w/ Thunderclap Newman’s “Something in the Air”, which seems rather appropriate of the current “changing of the, uh, guard”. Personally, a song which shows up periodically in dreams is Alan Parson’s (post-“Project” years) “Siren Song” (“…if I open up my channel, will you send me information?” is one of the lines).
I continue to “truck onwards”. Good to “hear” from other fellow travelers…
Craig
Hi Craig … I generally agree with all that you have held forth about OBE’s.
With regards to lucidity, I sense that asking guidance is the best first place to go. I continually find my guidance playing characters in my less lucid dreams. They “personalize” my non-physical experiences and are frequently encouraging me to become ‘more lucid’, so your suggestion that ‘our experiences are meant for us (not necessarily for others)’ is also my own experience.
As a second place to look for some help, I have always found WIlliam Buhlman helpful in the area of lucidity and taking control of our out of body experiences. He has a lot of free advice on his web site (astralinfo.org) including a downloadable document called “Keys to Control”.
“Keep on truckin”
Thanks for the feedback, Subtle!
I tend to get guidance in my dreams, prior to an OBE, in the form of strong senses of motion (I’m a very kinesthetic person). When these dreams occur in “light” sleep, almost as a hypnogogic state, I can almost “narrate” what’s going on; the experience the other night had me running and skating, feeling, very strongly, the physical-like motion that goes w/ the waking-life activity. As I awaken to a pre-OBE state, I often feel a strong sense of motion, which varies (spinning, rocking, undulating); I suspect that the variance of motion is an aspect of me experimenting w/ “ways to get me out”.
I have asked for “clarity of vision”, as well as assistance in “getting out”; so far, the vision is often dreamlike, while I’m aware that my physical eyes have opened under my eyemask. This leads to a “dual awareness” in my vision; the rather vague, dreamlike interiors I explore when “out”, plus an area of brighter light, from under my eyemask.
Again, I suspect that a strong “body awareness” holds me back, esp. an “over-awareness” of breathing (kind of the opposite issue from those, training in meditation, to “focus on one’s breathing”!) If I am able to “set this awareness aside”, I am usually able to “get up and out” for at least short excursions. Even with the “dim” vision, I am very aware that I’m “up and about”, and can make decisions to try things, much as I’d do if awake. If my focus begins to “drift”, I find I enter a dream-state, then, realizing this, quickly reintegrate physically.
Thanks for the suggestions; I do have the Bill Buhlman books (and would love to take his “OBE-Intensive” at TMI eventually), plus others, who have similar suggestions.
Craig