Self Observation

Self-Observation

Self-Observation

Intimate Self-Observation of oneself is a practical means of achieving a radical transformation.

To know and to observe are different. Many confuse self-observation with knowing. One knows that one is seated in a chair in a room, yet this does not mean that one is observing the chair.

We know that at a given moment we find ourselves in a negative state, perhaps with some problem, or worried about this or that matter, or in a state of disquiet or uncertainty, etc. — but this does not mean we are observing it.

Do you feel antipathy for someone? Does a certain person rub you the wrong way? Why? You will say that you know that person… Please! Observe him; to know is never to observe; do not confuse knowing with observing…

Self-observation, which is one hundred percent active, is a means of changing oneself; whereas knowing, which is passive, is not.

Certainly, to know is not an act of attention. Attention directed toward within oneself, toward what is happening in our interior — yes, that is something positive, active…

In the case of a person to whom we have antipathy — just like that, because we feel like it, and many times without any motive — one notices the multitude of thoughts that accumulate in the mind, the group of voices that speak and shout disorderedly within oneself, what they are saying, the disagreeable emotions that surge in our interior, the disagreeable taste that all this leaves in our psyche, etc., etc., etc.

Obviously, in such a state we also realize that interiorly we are treating the person to whom we have antipathy very badly. But to see all this, an attention directed intentionally toward the interior of oneself is unquestionably necessary — not a passive attention.

Dynamic attention really proceeds from the observing side, while thoughts and emotions belong to the observed side.

All this makes us comprehend that to know is something completely passive and mechanical, in evident contrast with self-observation, which is a conscious act.

By this we do not mean that mechanical self-observation does not exist; but such a type of observation has nothing to do with the psychological self-observation to which we are referring.

To think and to observe are also very different. Any subject can give himself the luxury of thinking about himself all he wishes, but this does not mean he is really observing himself.

We need to see the distinct “I-s” in action, to discover them in our psyche, to comprehend that within each one of them exists a percentage of our own consciousness, to repent of having created them, etc.

Then we shall exclaim: “But what is this I doing?” “What is it saying?” “What is it that it wants?” “Why does it torment me with its lust?” “With its anger?” etc., etc., etc.

Then we will see within ourselves all that train of thoughts, emotions, desires, passions, private comedies, personal dramas, elaborate lies, discourses, excuses, morbid scenes, beds of pleasure, pictures of lasciviousness, etc., etc., etc.

Many times, before falling asleep, in the precise instant of transition between vigil and dream, we feel within our own mind distinct voices that speak among themselves — they are the distinct I-s, who must break in such moments all connection with the diverse centers of our organic machine in order to submerge themselves later in the molecular world, in the “Fifth Dimension.”

The Two Worlds

To observe and to observe oneself are two completely different things; however, both demand attention.

In observation, the attention is oriented outward, toward the exterior world, through the windows of the senses.

In self-observation of oneself, the attention is oriented inward; and for this, the senses of external perception do not serve — a motive more than sufficient for it to be difficult for the neophyte to observe his intimate psychological processes.

The point of departure of official science on its practical side is the observable. The point of departure of the Work upon oneself is self-observation — the self-observable.

Unquestionably, these two points of departure cited above lead us in completely different directions.

Someone could grow old engrossed among the intransigent dogmas of official science, studying external phenomena, observing cells, atoms, molecules, suns, stars, comets, etc., without experiencing within himself any radical change.

The class of knowledge that interiorly transforms someone could never be attained through external observation.

True knowledge, which can really originate in us a fundamental interior change, has as its basis the direct self-observation of oneself.

It is urgent to tell our Gnostic students that they must observe themselves — and in what sense they must self-observe themselves, and the reasons for it.

Observation is a means to modify the mechanical conditions of the world. Interior self-observation is a means to change oneself intimately.

As a sequence or corollary of all this, we can and must affirm emphatically that there exist two classes of knowledge: the external and the internal; and that, unless we have within ourselves the magnetic center that can differentiate the qualities of knowledge, this mixture of the two planes or orders of ideas could lead us to confusion.

Sublime pseudo-esoteric Doctrines with marked scientific underpinnings belong to the terrain of the observable — however, they are accepted by many aspirants as internal knowledge.

We find ourselves before two worlds: the exterior and the interior. The first of these is perceived by the senses of external perception; the second can only be perceptible through the Sense of internal self-observation.

Thoughts, ideas, emotions, longings, hopes, disillusionments, etc., are interior — invisible to the ordinary, common, current senses — and yet they are for us more real than the dining-room table or the armchairs of the parlor.

Certainly we live more in our interior world than in the exterior; this is irrefutable, irrebuttable.

In our Internal Worlds — in our secret world — we love, desire, suspect, bless, curse, long for, suffer, enjoy, are defrauded, rewarded, etc., etc., etc.

Unquestionably, the two worlds, internal and external, are experimentally verifiable. The exterior world is the observable. The interior world is the self-observable in oneself and within oneself, here and now.

Whoever truly wishes to know the “Internal Worlds” of the planet Earth, of the Solar System, or of the Galaxy in which we live, must first know his intimate world, his particular interior life, his own “Internal Worlds.” “Man, know thyself, and thou shalt know the Universe and the Gods.”

The more this “Interior World” called “Oneself” is explored, the more one shall comprehend that one lives simultaneously in two worlds, in two realities, in two ambits — the exterior and the interior.

In the same way that it is indispensable to learn to walk in the “exterior world” — so as not to fall into a precipice, not to lose oneself in the streets of the city, to select one’s friendships, not to associate with perverse people, not to eat poison, etc. — so also, through the Psychological Work upon oneself, we learn to walk in the “Interior World,” which is explorable through self-observation of oneself.

Truly, the Sense of self-observation of oneself is found atrophied in the decadent human race of this dark epoch in which we live. To the measure that we persevere in self-observation of ourselves, the Sense of intimate self-observation will go on developing progressively.

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Self-Observation Self-Observation Intimate Self-Observation of oneself is a practical means of achieving a radical transformation.