Fragment 37

I am going to divide this "Fragment" into two parts. In the first part I shall conclude my series on the "Search of the True Self". When I say conclude this does not mean I shall not take up the subject at some point in the future. There may be no way to conclude such a subject. I am going to stop at what I view is a milestone in the search for the True Self. It is the end of one phase and the beginning of a new phase in the search for the True Self. This milestone is the encounter with the Lurker at the Threshold. I am using Bulwar-Lytton's term from his book: "Zanoni". Aleister Crowley recommends this book in "Magick: In Theory and Practice", for the sake of brevity I shall refer to this book as "Magick" in this "Fragment". E. Bulwar-Lytton's book should be read by all aspiring Occultists. In the second part of this "Fragment" I shall have some remarks on reincarnation and karma. Both of these topics are interrelated; this should become clear as we proceed. So let us begin. The Lurker has many names; he-she is a frightening entity that every true seeker of the self will encounter in his-her inner journey. The Lurker is the Beast, the primal manifestation of the human form. The evolved psyche of the naked ape. I have written about the Beast in a previous "Fragment" in which I examined the ideas of Demond Morris as expressed in his book "The Naked Ape" To begin I am going to examine two accounts of encountering the Lurker, one fictional and the other from real life. The fictional account is R.L. Stevenson's 1886 book: "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", the non-fictional account we could call "The Strange Case of Vince Furnier and Alice Cooper". Stevenson's 1886 novel is seldom read today, because everyone knows the secret of Jekyll and Hyde. The basic story is that Dr. Jekyll has an unnamed vice in which he wants to indulge without risking his social and professional reputation. So he invents an elixir that separates his good self from his bad self. Although Mr. Hyde does not seem all that evil, instead he seems to have very little self-control and anger management issues. This causes Mr. Hyde to get himself into a lot of trouble, so much trouble that Dr. Jekyll can not get him out of trouble. And to add to this Dr. Jekyll loses control of the transformation. It seems the elixir has a lot of unwanted side effects. This results in the Jekyll-Hyde figure committing sucide. I want to made a few points about Mr. Hyde that are important.Mr, Hyde besides being unattractive is both younger and smaller than Dr. Jekyll. Stevenson did this because the Mr. Hyde self does not have the benefit of much experience or socal development. It must be said as the story proceeds Mr. Hyde does gain some development and experience, but not in time to save him. Let us turn to the non-fiction example of Vince Furnier and Alice Cooper. Before Vince Furnier became a rockstar he was the son of a Mormon Minister. Instead of using an alchemical elixir like Dr. Jekyll , Furnier's elixir was hard liquor. It also must be said that Furnier recognized the parallels between his life and Jekyll and Hyde. (he made a video of one of his tours titled "The Strange Case of Alice Cooper'') Furnier went through an identity crisis like Dr. Jekyll. Furnier could turn himself into the dark rock and roll bad boy by drinking his elixir. Alice Cooper is of course the Lurker; the Beast that has been freed. Vince Furnier is what is called the "False Ego" or Kant's "Transcendental Unity of Apperception", Freud's "Ego". The self that has been created by society, parents, religion, and societal expectations. Of course, the False Ego is in reality many Egregores that have congregated together in a single physical agent. Unlike Dr. Jekyll, Furnier was successful in ridding himself of the Lurker (Alice Cooper). He stopped drinking. The Lurker scared the False Ego (Vince Furnier) enough to stop drinking. As I said earlier, like Dr Jekyll, Furnier failed in his encounter with the Lurker. He retreated into the socially constructed persona of Vince Furnier. Furnier went back to being the Minister's son. He even went so far as to play Celebrity Golf Tournaments for charity. Something we can not imagine Alice Cooper doing. Both Dr. Jekyll, and Furnier failed in their encounter with the Lurker, instead fleeing back to their socially constructed persona. One of the differences between Furnier and Dr. Jekyll is that Furnier did not want to give up the fame and fortune of Alice Cooper, although he did give up the vices of Alice Cooper. So he continued to act like Alice Cooper on stage. The Alice Cooper that Furnier pretended to be was a pale reflection of the real Alice Cooper. Not only was the presence of the pretended "Alice Cooper" different, even the voice changed. For those who are interested in the change, one only has to compare the real "Alice Cooper" in performance to the pretended "Alice Cooper". The true "Alice Cooper'' can be viewed in the film "Good to See You Again" while the pretended "Alice Cooper" can be viewed in the video performance titled "The Strange Case of Alice Cooper". Both Dr. Jekyll and V. Furnier failed to integrate or I should say "educate" the Luker into taking over as the true homonculus of the agent. The encounter with the Lurker is when one confronts all the lies, and repressions that have been imposed on the Beast. The Lurker is the chained, and crippled. Beast. The chains and the injuries are the sigils that society, parents, and Egregores, that have been driven into the Beast to make him harmless and controllable. To make the Beast deny himself-herself for the socially constructed (false) ego. The false ego is the agents committee of ruling Egregores. It is no coincidence that Aleister Crowley called himself the "Beast". This is what makes the encounter with the Luker so terrifying and explosive. The Beast is angry with all those that have hurt him-her, this includes the false Ego. The Beast has access to the primal energies that animate living things. Society and the Egregores have sought to use the energies of the Beast for their own purposes. The Beast does have self control problems because, instead of educating the Beast he-she has been shackled and tortured by the sigils that have been drive into his-her flesh, this is why the Beast is so dangerous. The Beast is the Gurdjieff's rightful owner of the Chariot (body). The Beast not only has a connection with the body, but is the mental half of the naked ape. The energies of the Beast can give a person great physical strength or mental acuity. I will make a diversion here to an example of what the Beast is capable of when he-she slips its bounds. When I was young there was a family friend that worked with the movie studios, he was in props (guns), and he told me about a discussion he had with the World War 2 hero Audie Murphy when he was making movies. My friend asked Murphy if he had really done all those things in his military service. Murphy answered that he did not know. He said he blacked out, and when he recovered he found himself surrounded by dead soldiers and carnage. And then people told him what he did. This is an example of what the Beast is capable of when he-she is in danger and slips his-her bounds. The aspirant must recognize the Beast and accept the Beast in order to make use of the primal energies to do the Great Work. The Beast is the rightful sovereign of the psyche and should make the choice of what committee of Egregores he-she wishes to take counsel from. The encounter with the Lurker is the reason many feel such overpowering fear when they start Occult practices of meditation. The false ego never wants to give up power. One should not think that the false ego dies or goes away after the encounter with the Lurker, instead it hangs around, and will take any opportunity to regain power. I have witnessed this personally in other people. A less dramatic example can be seen when one seems to wake up to certain ideas or truths, only to relapse back into their old ways soon after. To have a successful encounter with the Lurker, one must recognize the Lurker is the primal manifestation of the True Self in human form. Once this is done the work of creation and education can begin. And here is where I shall stop, even though there is much more to say. Let us now move to the second part of this "Fragment" on reincarnation. I shall reveal one the secrets of reincarnation. This is not a secret that anyone is sworn to keep. Instead, it is so obvious that it gets overlooked. As I have said before karma and reincarnation are interrelated, this must be kept in mind. The trouble with the doctrine of reincarnation is one should be thinking about one's future life, and not dreaming about past lives. While it is pleasant to to think about the great love one possessed when he-she was Marc Anthony, or Cleopatra this does not help one in realizing Occult truths. The future life is more important than the past lives. Aleister Crowley recognized this and warned about indulging in fantasies of past lives. I quote (Magick: Chapter VII): "The first great danger arises from vanity. One should always beware of "remembering" that one was Cleopatra or Shakespeare." This is why many Occult teachers and religions deny reincarnation, because it leads to fantasy and not work. Aleister Crowley recommends spending time thinking and putting into practice preparations for one's next life. He does this in his books, two examples would be the above quoted "Magick", and his novel "Moonchild". I am going to give an example of a famous philosopher that did not put off his karma for the next life, but dealt with it in the present life to illustrate what I am talking about. I do not know if Martin Heidegger believed in karma, or reincarnation. Heidegger's admirers are always trying to avoid, or make excuses for Heidegger joining the Nazi party for a brief time; to his credit Heidegger never did. Heidegger owned his mistake, and suffered the consequences. I think instead of being avoided this shows Heidegger's integrity. Unlike other German intellectuals that were associated with the Nazi party, Heidegger did not make his apologies and required self flagellation to save his career and reputation, instead he suffered the karma for his actions. This is the best evidence of Heidegger's integrity. Back to our subject. In the above mentioned book ("Magick"), Crowley gives some tips on remembering past lives. Crowley believed in previous incarnations he had been the Seer Edward Kelley, the Occult philosopher Eliphas Levi, and a Roman by the name of Marius de Aquila. In my opinion and that is all this is, I claim no occult knowledge, I think Crowley spent a number of lives as an Aghori. This would explain some of Cowley's more outrageous actions. The problem was Crowley started to enjoy these actions for their shock value., instead of using the energy that these actions created for spiritual growth. I think this happened because Crowley's Aghori brothers were not around to remind him of the purpose of embracing the unclean and the terrible. Let us now turn to some tips on how to remember past lives and use the doctrine of reincarnation to further one's spiritual growth. My method is similar to Crowley's method. The way to remember one's past lives is to connect it with doing work on one's future life. One must do a life review, this review must be done in an honest and somber manner. This means going back and observing the karma that one has created in this life. This is done by examining all one's relationships with other people from the most casual to the most intimate. One must review and observe all the interactions one has had with other people, and the reasons for the interactions. If this is done with the right attitude, dreamlike memories shall arise from past lives. If one wants to deny reincarnation and attribute these dreamlike memories to the karma of this life, it does not make much difference for practice. The reason being is that this practice also helps one make decisions for this life. It is very important when doing a life review to ask yourself the following question about each person one has known: Do I want this person in my next life? This shall tell one what work had to be done in this life. This question should also be asked about every situation one has found oneself in. If this practice is followed with diligence one shall notice chunks of karma drop off. (the ancient Jain religion was onto something in interpreting karma as a physical particle that sticks to you, instead of the more psychological interpretation of Buddhism) An analogy would be of a beautiful ancient statue that has spent a long time under the sea. When the statue is recovered it is encrusted with sea life that distorts its true form. These sea creatures must be knocked off to reveal the true beautiful form of the statue. End