We use the terms Light, energy, etheric substance, teloplasm, cytoplasm, colloidal substance, and living matter to represent degrees of grossness (or fineness) in setting up a referent for the word mater, or matter. Lightergy is the Light Mother—not the mother of Light, the Light Mother. The energy wave-frequencies, which make up mattergy, are aspects of the World Mother -- in function, the genetrix. We will probably use them interchangeably for our purposes in this lesson. Each of these divisions of lightergy or mattergy is characterized by a wave, not in the substance, light, living matter, but a wave of the substance. The number of waves per unit of time is called frequency. We generally hyphenate those terms and say “wave-frequency.”

That, which characterizes psychic world functioning, whether it is conscious or unconscious, is the wave-frequency of the substances thereof. The wave-frequency is determined by the basic point in the individualizing process of the Power-to-be-conscious on the Mind Level and the aggregation of all the constituents of that state. The Power-to-be-conscious, Self-aware on its own level, the Mind Level, is what we call the Individualized Field. Shall I say that over again? It's quite important. Let me tell you how important it is. When we wish to create something, we establish it in the field before there is any configuration representative of the pattern of the field. This is the secret of inner work. The average Aristotelian, the good objective identifier, wants to work and save and put the money in the bank and let it grow and accumulate. Then when he has sufficient funds in the bank, he'll launch his project. We work just the other way around. We think that the idea, the ideational pattern in the field, is more important than anything else. We begin by conceiving the idea, then we hold it in the field, and by and by it percolates down to the psychic world. I am not referring to a mental concept here, and I say conceive rather than think, because all of the thinking in the world will not conceive the Idea. I am referring to the pattern in the field, the Ideational Level, what Plato called the world of Pure Idea. We capitalize it to differentiate it from concept or opinion on the mental level. Today we could use the pattern of the individualized field as a synonym for Plato's world of pure Idea. Conceive the Idea, hold it in the field, and eventually the psyche will reflect it.

When the psyche reflects it you begin to get enthusiastic, emotionally stirred, full of eagerness and aspiration. Here is the point where many people make a mistake. They tell others about that idea and “exhaust all the steam in the boiler.” You must bottle up all that enthusiasm in order to convert it into the oomph, the push. Be very secretive. No matter how intimate a person is, do not allow intimacy and a burst of confidence to spill it out, because there will be nothing left. You must bottle up all of that enthusiasm, eagerness, and joyousness so that it goes out into the psychic world frequencies. Then the configurational process occurs—it manifests. This is the way to use this knowledge to do your work. You will also learn as you grow into it that you have to be exceedingly careful what you think or what you wish, because that is going to happen too. You must be extremely circumspect in regard to the ideas to which you lend yourself. Just get an idea, don't conceive it. Hold it off and look at it a long time before you let it in, because if you let it in before you know that's what you want you will reap the consequences. You'll have a referent for the scriptural statement that “man shall be accounted for every idle word that he uttereth.”

Now I want to go on just another step concerning this wave-frequency. The aggregation of wave-frequencies created, set in operation, engendered by the Power-to-be-conscious at its basic point in its individualizing process, becomes loaded with the gunas, qualities, of the psychic world. In the developing process it is very difficult to penetrate that fog of desirings, feelings, emotional perturbations, and mentalizations, etc. Also, the cortical functions are busy justifying, finding alibis or excuses, or manufacturing reasons for the qualities of feelings, desirings, emotings, lovings and thinkings in the psychic world.

But if this wave-frequency engendered by the Power-to-be-conscious in its pristine purity could be contacted, we would label it bliss. We could label it ecstasy, higher buddhi, ananda, the joy song, God intoxicated, etc. But before the purificatory process of the psychic nature is finished, it is extremely difficult to penetrate to this resonant quality of the pristine wave-frequency in the field on the Mind Level. A miasmic fog composed of the content of the psychic nature, including all the mentalized justifications, which the content of the psychic nature motivates, separates the developing consciousness from it. And “except we become as little children...” —not childish, like little children—we cannot reach this kingdom of functioning in the pure pristine wave-frequencies of the Power-to-be-conscious on its own level. We must clear ourselves of the dream world, the miasmic fog, until the psyche is so free from interferences that it reflects the Light Worlds, the Light Be-ings, or it reflects its own true individualizing Self, the Real Self.

We are now ready for the description of the four methodologies for dealing with the psychic nature that was mentioned in Lesson 6. The first step in the process is purification of the psyche by autosuggestion. This statement is predicated upon the way the psyche functions. The etheric substance operates as a reflector in that metamorphozing process of the substance that we label the Mother. The totality of that which is reflected by the etheric substance is what we call the psychic nature.

If you have any confusion about this label psyche, psychic nature, then use a synonym, the unconscious; but the word unconscious as a synonym has validity only relative to objective identification. Otherwise it has no validity at all. Confusion exists among psychoanalysts and psychiatrists due to their basis of approach. Because of the limitations of objective identification, they search and search for something in their manifold of values accruing from objective identification for experiences, repressions, suppressions, childhood reactions, influences, etc. When they cannot find anything in their probing through all of the experiences of childhood, they may even go to the intrauterine state of the embryo looking for something that it registered and then repressed. That represents objective identification going off the deep end to find a reason, an objective cause for everything that happens to a person, or by which he is motivated.

In my opinion they have the cart before the horse, that just the opposite is the way to search. They should begin by examining the content of the psychic nature. The gunas or qualities loaded on to the wave-frequencies of the higher level are the motivating causes for that which eventuates in the objective, manifest side. Here is an example to illustrate why. The sadistic cruelty of a father will affect one child in the family one way, will affect another child in the same family subjected to the same sadistic cruelty another way, and a third child won't be affected at all. Why? Because the qualities accumulated in the formative psyche, or carried over in the palingenetic process, differ in each one. That experience of cruelty, or mother fixation, or whatever else that may be discovered, operates only as the inciting cause, something for the substances and the qualities to light upon. One child has it and lights upon it and is affected. Another child is affected differently, maybe oppositely. A drunken father would cause some children not to be drunkards, but never to touch an alcoholic drink. A third child might not be affected either way, because of the content of the formative psyche in the childhood state.

The basic point in the individualizing process on the Mind Level on the part of the Power-to-be-conscious is telekinesical. The time comes during the purification of the psyche when we are wholly responsive to telekinesical influences, persuaded by nothing else. We describe that phase as coming under the influence of the Light World, becoming oriented and polarized to the influence of the Christos. That point is reached when the psychic nature is sufficiently purified for the etheric substance to reflect that higher world. The purification by way of autosuggestion is predicated upon the way the psychic nature functions, or the way the content of the unconscious operates motivationally within each and every one of us—two ways of saying it.

Let me repeat this important point: The etheric substance operates as a reflector. Any wave-frequency level in the process above the etheric level is too brilliant to reflect. The brilliancy of energy or lightergy is beyond human understanding, unless one has seen it.

Welders who use an electric torch will tell you when they start to weld, “Don't look at this. You will injure your eyes.” Serious eye injury can result from looking at that electric arc. The light that we call energy and the brilliancy of what we call Light (when energy is metamorphosed into Light) is infinitely more brilliant than that electric torch. That Light-energy is so brilliant that it can't reflect. The metamorphosing process has to be toned down—clear down to the etheric level of grossness—before it is dull enough to reflect. It is like a burnished mirror with the sun shining on it, and yet it reflects.

In the early formative processes of the development of the psychic nature there is no conscious control of what is reflected. I am not going to stress this point because you probably have enough experiences and know a number of persons who exemplify what I am saying. In the formative phases of the psychic nature the etheric substance has no discrimination, differentiation, conscious volition, etc., about what it reflects. It will reflect anything, anything, just like a mirror. Put anything up to a mirror and the mirror doesn't discriminate or differentiate. The mirror doesn't say, “Oh, no, I won't reflect this poinsettia.” It just reflects. Period. We say of those persons who are in that state that they are pliant types. Put them in any environment and they will reflect it. In a lovely, beautiful environment, they'll reflect it, but it's not theirs. They are only reflecting. Put them in evil associations, they'll reflect those and think it’s themselves. They'll think they are doing it, because there is that cortex justifying, reasoning, manufacturing alibis and excuses. This is the way the psyche is formed.

Because it's invisible, because it's not objective, because we can't see it or otherwise register it with our physical senses, many make the mistake of thinking that when an influence comes in, it must be God. Because they can't account for it by any sense perception, they decide, “It must be some Higher One visiting me.” In fact, it is only the person’s own psyche. An extremely valuable experience for those who are bound in objective identity, such as psychoanalysts and psychiatrists, would be to learn to dissociate from the configuration and cross over and learn the psychic world firsthand, by conscious and independent functioning in it. That is the way I learned it, thoroughly. That is not difficult to do. From a higher level we don't even consider it very important. If we in this School had the right combination of conditions, I could take anyone, no matter how deeply he is identified in objectivity, and in ninety days show him how to go out of his body consciously and come back with full memory of his experiences. I don't consider it very important and I don't consider it high development, but having that experience certainly will make obvious how those hidden (relative to objective identification) forces work. You can see how they are acquired and/or cultivated, and how they operate, just like ‘things’ and ‘objects’ to sense perception. The whole psychiatric practice would be turned upside down and they would reverse their attitude. They would seek to find the content of the unconscious, and they would seek to understand the way the gunas, qualities, are loaded on to the basic fundamental wave-frequencies of the field. When they can understand that, then they will understand how motivations take place.

Every feeling that you have is not your feeling. You are motivated by some quality on the wave-frequency of someone you've picked up. Every thought that you think is not your thought. You merely tuned in and picked up a wave-frequency loaded with the quality, the guna, or the content of someone's consciousness. The totality of all that wave-frequency loaded with all kinds of feelings, desirings, emotions, and thinkings is what we call the race psyche. There is no mystery to it. The only mystery is that one is so objectively identified he can't break that objective identification to realize there is this world which motivates him.

Let us return to the first way to train the psyche—by autosuggestion. Treat the psyche, particularly in this pliant, negative state, as you would an obstreperous child. That means don't plead with it, and don't listen to it, as if it were God speaking to you. Don't listen to it. Command it. I mean get a commanding attitude toward it, and don't relax that attitude. When you go to sleep at night, talk to your psyche. Talk right out loud if there's no one around or if you're not disturbing anyone. Talk to it and let it know who's the boss. I want you to get that attitude toward the psyche. Specifically tell your psyche what you want it to do while it is out of your body. You can't go to sleep unless it goes out, or infolds. So say to your psyche, “Go and learn.” There are worlds teeming with entities and Be-ings.

This is like the Idea on Mind Level. Be careful, very circumspect. Go to your secret heart of hearts, to the secret place of the most high, and find out what you really want. Some of us want Light and wisdom. Some of us want understanding beyond every-thing else. All right. If you find out in your secret place of the most high that is what you really want, tell your psyche, “Go and learn and experience. Do it. Hear me? Get out of here!” The metaphysical approach of saying, “Supinely I sit and fold my hands and wait and my own will come to me,” is not the way to proceed. Talk to your psyche and let it know precisely what you want it to do.

That is working with autosuggestion. Keep doing it, but don't expect the psyche to correct its random and undisciplined habits in a night or two or a week or two. If you haven't disciplined the psyche it is all at sixes and sevens. It is going out on its own, motivated by the content of its own south half, and maybe having a Saturnalia all by itself. It is undisciplined. I am talking about disciplining it. If you will keep working with it, pretty soon the etheric substance will reflect your suggestions into the psyche and the psyche will operate on them. It will operate on what is given it autosuggestively. (Please allow me to say this, even though it is through this instrumentality that it is being given): This is one of the most valuable lessons you ever heard or ever will hear—how to discipline your own psyche and have it help you in the developing process, even though the developing process might mean getting what you should not have. You have to learn what you should or shouldn't have. And even though you get what you shouldn't have, it is still a developing process. We can utilize this in a highly constructive way just by giving orders to the psyche. Don't plead with it. Command it. Make it obey, don’t just listen to it. It is not dependable at all. It will obey if you are persistent. Later on, when we get to the fourth attitude that we have toward the psyche, it becomes dependable, but we are a long way, narratively speaking, from getting to that point.

Let’s say the last thing you did when you went to sleep was to charge your psyche. Then the first thing in the morning, before your cortex gets busy on the objective side of life and mundane affairs which we all have to do, keep your cortex still. The cortex can be obscurating. Command your psyche to report, “Where did you go? What did you do?” Then keep still. This time you are going to listen, because you have the positive side now. You have commanded it to tell you, so listen. “Where did you go? Who did you see? What did you do?” Practice until that is just as patent, just as open and shut as anything that you do with little children. When little children have been out of sight and come home you might ask, “Where have you been? What have you been doing? Look at you! I want to know where you've been and what you've been doing.” I want you to have that attitude toward the psyche. Work at that, folks, work at it, until you have that psyche whipped into shape like a tough top sergeant has a squad of rookies under expert drill. You can do it just like that tough sergeant. “Present arms. Squad right. March.” You practice and practice and practice it. By and by you will have one of the finest helpers in the success story of health and well-being, of light and understanding, of wisdom, creativity, and individualization. You have everything to win and nothing to lose.

We will continue with the other three methodologies in our next lesson.

During this lecture, a member of the audience asked Vitvan the question: How far can you go in putting an idea in someone else's field?

Vitvan responded: The way I handle that is that I keep my mind off of everyone or anyone, for this reason. There is a very razor's edge sharpness between what we call white magic and black magic. The only way I can tell you is what I do and you can size it up. The way I do it is, if I put my mind on any person for any reason whatever, I have crossed over that razor's edge line, and I won't do it.

But I hold my idea in my consciousness. Around the world someone will pick it up and respond to it. (Space offers no interference with it at all.) If others pick up the frequency and respond and come in and participate in the configurational process or in the field, wonderful! That was all voluntary on their part, not by any inner persuasion.

That respect for the integrity, the free moral agency, of each and every one must be observed. I'll lean way over backwards to preserve it. Not even for the other person's welfare or good do we cross over, because who is wise enough to determine what is good for another one? Maybe his agonized suffering that your sympathy wants to go out to and relieve represents his highest good. He may not be able to learn in any other way. Who is wise enough to determine what is good for another one? That's what I mean by lean way over backwards. Never cross over that line, because the moment you cross over you've opened a door to the black magic: the imposition of your egotistical opinions, ideas, thoughts and desires upon someone else. Please don't do it. Each one must tread the winepress alone. If he doesn't do it alone, how is he going to develop his individuality? How is he going to emerge as a Be-ing? There is no compromise.

When I tell you what we do, there is still no compromise. Very often we lend support to another one when support over a bad place, a hump, is needed and merited. To use an analogy, those of us who have raised our little babies and our children and are teaching them to walk, we lend them a finger. We let them hold on to a finger and toddle. In a few weeks we slyly withdraw the finger. Little by little we withdraw even the finger and let them toddle, even though they fall, and get up, and fall and get up; as soon as possible we withdraw the finger. Use that.

—Vitvan, Tape series dated 1955 - 1956  —Marj Coffman, ed., 1997