Aspects of human behaviour

From Free Man Creator

This topic page complements the topic pages for Human 'I' and Human character - the I and threefold soul, and covers aspects of human soul experience and human behaviour.

Soul experience

The individual human constitution, the specific structural make up of our different bodily principles, partly defines our human character.

These bodies are used by the human 'I' to have a soul experience, as coined by the phrase "The I plays on the instrument of the soul and the different strings of human soul life", see Human character - the I and threefold soul. Hence the soul is a mediator between the outer physical world (including the human physical body) and the inner core (including the human astral body and human I)

This complex and rich soul experience consists of the whole human inner life, including a.o.:

Aspects

soul qualities

that differentiate people:

  • lazy or active thinker
  • life attitude: seriousness or light-hearted chatterbox
  • attentiveness
active interest
  • see Schema FMC00.596 on Metamorphosis
  • in others
  • in nature and the wonders of the world
  • boredom: Only the human being can be bored, not animals. People can be classified according to their capacity for boredom: those leading a simple soul life are bored far less than the so-called educated ones. People of the educated strata and classes whose soul life is complicated are prone to boredom .. and country people are far less bored than city people. (1910-11-02-GA115)
nervousness
  • impact of materialism on nervous diseases
    • The materialistic worldview is uninterested in truly meeting the human being, and certainly not the growing human being; it turns away from the human being, and develops an indifference in the teacher toward the most intimate movements of the souls of those being educated. Hence teaching has become in essence of a phlegmatic nature, phlegma became an aspect of all education in the materialistic era ... and this is the reason for the appearance of nervous disease (or nervous disorganization) in our culture, and why nervous diseases such as depression are so widespread today? (1924-04-08-GA308)
    • Today a disease is widespread which was hardly known a hundred years ago is nervousness, which is a disease of recent times, without the coming of the materialistic worldview it would never have come about at such scale. Within decades it will have a destructive effect on public health. Children would be born trembling ... experiencing to every environment a sense of grief. Mental illnesses would spread awfully fast: epidemics of madness and mental illnesses would occur in the coming decades. (1906-08-28-GA095)
    • The nervousness of the people of the present day is the result of the materialistic frame of mind in our age ... if the high tide of materialism continues, great epidemics of nervous diseases will break out and children will be born with quivering limbs. (1907-11-21-GA100)
  • exercise for overcoming nervousness and forgetfulness: bringing the I consciously into connection with the deed and forms a picture of it, producing a pictorial image. this strengthens the etheric body as the bearer of memory. (1912-01-11-GA143)
anger
  • see 1909-12-05-GA059, 1914-01-15-GA063
  • anger punishes the angry person more than its target - some quotes: anger is the punishment you give to yourself for someone else's mistakes ... anger and resentment are poisons you take, hoping others will die (Wayne Dyer) ... anger is an emotion that does more harm to the vessel in which it is stored than to anything on which it is poured (Seneca)
conscience
lying or truthfullness
  • lying is a luciferic influence. If the human being has been a liar in his past earthly life, in the first half of life between death and a new birth one sees how he becomes a servant of the Luciferic hosts. All egoism in later lives is prepared by lying in earlier lives. By putting himself out of the truth, man puts himself out of humanity. Karmically, egoism comes from lying. (1913-01-23-GA246)
  • A lie in the physical world becomes an agent of destruction, a murder in the astral world (and the origin of black magic). In the astral world, every feeling, every idea is a visible form, a living force. The astral lie brings about an impact between the false and true forms, resulting in death. (1906-06-02-GA094)
  • explanation: Whenever you relate something, you produce the corresponding thought-form, this also rays out a thought-form (in the astral world). If your thought-form corresponds (with the reality of it), then the two forms flow together upon the astral plane and strengthen each other. You thus strengthen the life of the being you are talking about. In the case of an untruth, the thought-form streaming out of your words does not correspond with that which goes out from the thing itself; the forms collide and destroy each other. Thus an untruth has a life-destroying, killing effect on them. (1906-06-29-GA094)
awe or wonder
humor
  • A humorous attitude is an expansion of the soul and spirit, whereas a serious mood brings the spirit-soul aspect of human nature into closer contact with the physical body. (1920-04-29-GA301)
worrying
  • "Much worry dries out and withers the physical brain. Worried thoughts make furrows in it and thereby make one think such thoughts repeatedly. The physical body becomes a hindrance to a Man’s progress. Facial wrinkles reflect these groove[s]. Worries live in a certain astral substance; soters [sic] are highly developed individualities who take this sorrow substance upon themselves." (1908-11-11-GA266/1)
    • note on the word 'soter': in another lecture (1909-06-27-GA266/1) soter is used as another word for sorrow, whereas in 1921-06-02-GA204 the word comes up in context of Scotus Erigenas' teachings ... "the doctrine concerning what Man has to expect in the future, namely, entrance into the divine-spiritual world ... what in modern usage would be called soteriology. “Soter,” after all, means savior; the teaching of the future is eschatology. Erigena here deals with the concepts of the Crucifixion and Resurrection, the emanation of Divine Grace, Man's path into the divine-spiritual, world, and so on."
other
  • critiquing others and jealousy
    • people full of criticism of others (and who feel themselves it is a good characteristic to draw attention to these), are often the (transformed, masked) result of jealousy in earlier incarnations (1910-11-26-GA125)
  • previous incarnations - metamorphosis of soul qualities; see Schema FMC00.596 on topic page Metamorphosis (and 1924-02-24-GA235, 1924-03-15-GA235, 1924-03-30-GA239, 1924-05-10-GA236)

bodily expressions

reactions of the physical body as an expression of inner experiences:

laughter and weeping
  • includes: sadness, tears, ...
  • laughing and weeping can be a means whereby the I can educate itself and further strengthen its powers .. in human life there is a kind of pendulum which swings to and fro between laughter (to free one-self) and tears (to search for one-self). laughter and tears are revelations of the spirit .. in laughter Man seeks an outward expression of inner liberation, in tears Man experiences an inner strengthening after the I has suffered a loss in the external world. (1910-02-03-GA059)
  • laughter is a process that makes us organically healthy and acts as a healthy undisturbed digestive system; whereas inner sadness causes a hardening and causes us to work against our digestive processes and what we can digest and move from the stomach into the intestines. (1921-06-12-GA302)
  • see also: 1911-02-26-GA127
  • laughing
    • Man laughs when he fancies himself to be above what he sees, Man feels superior to something or other in the environment, and the I brings this to expression by expanding the astral body. Typically it gives a short out-breath and a long in-breath.(1909-04-27-GA107)
  • weeping
    • In the phenomena of weeping the astral body is compressed by the I and this squeezes out the breath, the breathing of someone who is weeping, consists essentially of a short in-breath and a long out-breath. (1909-04-27-GA107)
    • the spiritual cause of weeping is sadness, the material consequence is the secretion of the lachrymatory glands (1907-06-22-GA100)
yawning
  • inclination to yawn when we see another person yawning .. is a remnant of the fact that in the Atlantean epoch there was a strong a subconscious reciprocal influence, invoking the collaboration of the other's soul ... a powerful effect was exercised on the other's soul the moment any image, any sensation, arose in the soul, and the will was directed upon the other. All influences were powerful, as was also the will to receive them (1909-06-29-GA112)
  • not just about fatigue
    • "Think of someone who does no work the whole day long, someone who has private wealth. He can go for walks, or he can move from one armchair to another—and from morning till night he's using up his forces just the same. I've noticed at workers' concerts that those who had been working all day were much less fatigued than the well-to-do people who had done nothing at all. The latter kept yawning, while the others were bright and lively." (1924-09-20-GA354)
sneezing
  • sneezing is not a conscious but a subconscious will impulse, and entirely a matter of organic life and health (1920-12-19-GA202)
  • the sound 'c' in primeval language was the Regent of Health, sneezing is not at all unlike a 'c'. Sneezing is a lightening process. In Germany and Austria, when a person sneezes, we still have a saying: Zur Gesundheit (to your good health). (1924-06-25-GA279)
coughing
  • If the lower organic sphere cannot be controlled by the upper, the healthy reaction manifests as the irritation leading to coughing, in order to prevent the invasion of certain things which are undesirable. Coughing is the attempt to get rid of such substances (better than the body will absorbs injurious substances). The tickling irritation which provokes coughing is a danger signal of sorts, that something is wrong in the organism and there's a need to repel the invaders. (1920-03-22-GA312)
  • whooping cough in children (sometimes also called called spasmodic cough)
    • with whooping cough the inhalation always remains proper ... but when the air wants to come out again when out-breathing it gets stuck and doesn't come out properly again, and that's when the coughing fit comes ... and because the air cannot come out properly, no fresh air can come in, and that is how whooping cough occurs. The underlying cause is that the inner mucous membrane of the respiratory system, of these tubes that go in and out of the lungs, becomes overly sensitive. Whooping cough is an illustration that one cannot say that the physical body does everything, one has to inquire about the astral body: When the child does not have spasmodic coughing, the astral body expels the air and the body is not bothered at all. With whooping cough, there is a sensitive spot as the astral body wants to scratch away, and the physical body has to come into action and has to expel the air spasmodically. (1923-04-14-GA349)
other
  • blushing (becoming red)

Illustrations

Schema FMC00.565: shows a simple schematic to the description the two main elements in soul life, and what takes place in the process of human sense perception and the creation of mental images, sensations and memory - as related to desire and judgement.

shows a simple schematic to the description the two main elements in soul life, and what takes place in the process of human sense perception and the creation of mental images, sensations and memory - as related to desire and judgement.

Schema FMC00.596: provides an overview and selection of statements related to the metamorphosis of the human being between two incarnations in the spirit world during the process between death and a new birth. This provides a synthetic summary for reference, the lectures on the right should be read to get context and full description.

Note: see also more in 1906-03-14-GA097.

provides an overview and selection of statements related to the metamorphosis of the human being between two incarnations in the spirit world during the process between death and a new birth. This provides a synthetic summary for reference, the lectures on the right should be read to get context and full description. Note: see also more in 1906-03-14-GA097.


Lecture coverage and references

Coverage overview

Reference extracts

Nervousness
1906-08-28-GA095

Today a disease is widespread which was hardly known a hundred years ago; not that it would not have been known, but it was really not very common: that is nervousness. This peculiar form of disease is the result of the materialistic worldview of the 18th century. Without the preceding of the materialistic worldview, it would never have come about.

The spiritual teacher knows that if materialism continued for decades, it would have a destructive effect on public health.

Were these materialistic habits of thought not to be adjusted, people would not only just be nervous, but children would be born trembling and experiencing not only the environment, but to every environment a sense of grief.

Above all, mental illnesses would spread awfully fast: epidemics of madness would occur in the coming decades. That was also the danger, which humanity was heading for: epidemic mental illnesses.

And this worldview of the future was the true reason, why the occult leaders of humanity, the masters of wisdom, saw the necessity of letting spiritual wisdom flow into general humanity. Only such a spiritual worldview can restore good health to the coming generations.

1907-11-21-GA100

Everything appears first of all in a spiritual way, and then it expresses itself later in the physical body.

The nervousness of the people of the present day is the result of the materialistic frame of mind in our age.

The wise leaders of humanity know that if the high tide of materialism were to continue, great epidemics of nervous diseases would break out, and children would be born with quivering limbs.

The anthroposophical movement was brought into the world to rescue humanity from the dangers of materialism.

One who spreads materialistic thought and feeling among the people is preparing the way for these devastating diseases; and one who combats materialism is fighting for the health of the people and its power to develop further. The individual can do but little towards his own health, for he is part of the whole body of humanity and draws the substances for his maintenance from the source that is common to all men.

One who sees into the laws of human evolution must observe with a bleeding heart how the individual suffers, and how his suffering is but the expression of the spiritual and mental aberration of the whole of humanity.

It is the task of anthroposophy not so much to help the individual but, rather, to give to the whole of humanity the upward swing into the spiritual, and thereby to work for the bodily health of humanity.

1912-01-11-GA143

(or translation V2)

is on 'overcoming nervousness'

quote A

There is a good exercise for gradually curing such forgetfulness. Suppose, for example, a lady is forever putting her brooch down when she takes it off in the evening, and then cannot find it in the morning. You might think the best cure for her forgetfulness would be to remember to put it always in the same place.

There is, however, a far more effective means of remembering where it is. This does not, of course, apply to all objects but in this case the lady should say to herself, “I will put my brooch in a different place each evening, but as I do so I will hold the thought in mind that I have put it in a particular spot. Then I will form a clear picture in my mind of all the surroundings. Having done this, I will go quietly away. I realize that if I only do this once, I probably will not succeed, but if I make a habit of it, I will find that my forgetfulness gradually disappears.”

This exercise is based on the fact that the person's I is brought consciously into connection with the deed he does, and also that he forms a picture of it. Connecting the I, that is, the spiritual kernel of Man's being, in this way with a pictorial image, sharpens memory. Such an exercise can be quite useful in helping us to become less forgetful.

Further results can also be attained from such an exercise. When it becomes habit to hold such thoughts when things are put aside, it represents a strengthening of the etheric body, which, as we know, is the bearer of memory.

But now assume you have advised someone to do this exercise not because he is forgetful but because he is nervous. It will prove to be an excellent cure. His etheric body will be strengthened and the nervous tendencies will disappear. In such cases, life itself demonstrates that what spiritual science teaches is correct.

1924-04-08-GA308

on why some people are nervous or suffer from neurasthenia

[phlegmatic teacher -> impact on child]

... let us consider the phlegmatic teacher. We will assume again that this teacher makes no attempt at self-knowledge or self-education regarding temperament.

It can be said of the phlegmatic that whatever comes to the child from such a person is not strong enough to meet the inner activity of the child’s soul. The inner impulses want to come out, to flow out, and the child wants to be active, but the teacher is phlegmatic and just lets things be. This teacher is unable to engage what flows out of the child, failing to encounter it with enough impressions and influences. It’s as if one were trying to breathe in a rarefied atmosphere, to use a physical analogy. The child’s soul “asphyxiates” when the teacher is phlegmatic.

When we see such a child in later life, we can understand why some people are nervous or suffer from neurasthenia, and so on. By going back to their childhood, we find that it is related to the uncontrolled phlegmatic temperament of an educator who failed to do important things with the child.

[premise and induction step]

We might even be able to explain widespread cultural pathologies in this way.

Why is it that nervous diseases such as depression are so widespread today?

You might be thinking I’m trying to convince you that, when the current generation of neurasthenic adults was being educated, the whole teaching profession was phlegmatic! I will reply that it did consist of phlegmatics - not in the usual sense of the word, but in a much deeper sense. We are speaking of the historical period of the nineteenth century when materialism rose. The materialistic worldview turns away from the human being, and develops a monstrous indifference in the teacher toward the most intimate movements of the souls of those being educated.

If, in an unbiased way, we can observe the cultural manifestations of the modern era, we find that a person may be a phlegmatic in that sense, even though that same person might angrily react to a child who spilled ink yelling: “You should not do that! You should not throw ink because you are angry; I’ll throw it back at you, you rascal!” Such outbursts of choleric temper were not the exception during the time I just described, nor am I suggesting that there was any shortage of sanguine or melancholic teachers.

But in their actual teaching, they were still phlegmatics and acted phlegmatic. The materialistic worldview was uninterested in meeting the human being, and certainly not the growing human being. Phlegma became an aspect of all education in the materialistic era. And it has a lot to do with the appearance of nervous disease, or nervous disorganization, in our culture. We will look at this in detail later. Nevertheless, we see the effect of phlegmatic teachers whose very presence next to children triggers nervous disorders.

Yawning
1909-06-29-GA112

Yesterday we mentioned the period in which a distinct sense of the I emerged, adding that the etheric body came to coincide with the physical body as the last third of the Atlantean age approached. You can imagine that previously the nature of leadership as well was quite different, for at that time there existed nothing like a mutual understanding among men resting on an appeal to reason. In those days of dim clairvoyance mutual understanding was based upon a subconscious influence passing from one to the other. Especially was there still present to a high degree something we know today only in its last misinterpreted and misunderstood survival, namely, a kind of suggestion, a subconscious reciprocal influence, invoking but little the collaboration of the other's soul.

Looking back to early Atlantean times we see that a powerful effect was exercized on the other's soul the moment any image, any sensation, arose in the soul, and the will was directed upon the other. All influences were powerful, as was also the will to receive them. Only scraps of all this have survived.

Picture to yourself a Man of that time passing another while executing certain gestures. If the observer were even slightly the weaker of the two he would have felt impelled to imitate and mimic all the gestures. The only surviving remnant of this sort of thing is our inclination to yawn when we see another person yawning. Formerly a far closer tie prevailed between human beings, based on the fact that they lived in an atmosphere totally different from that of today.

Laughing and weeping
1907-06-22-GA100

We have an analogous example in weeping. Its spiritual cause is sadness, but its material one is the secretion of the lachrymatory glands. It hardly seems possible that a famous modern scientist should have come to the same foolish conclusion mentioned above, but he actually made the monstrous statement that the human being does not weep because he feels sad, but that he feels sad because he weeps!

1909-04-27-GA107

Why does a person laugh?

Someone invariably laughs when he fancies himself to be above what he sees. You can always find this statement verified. Whether you are laughing at yourself or at someone else your I is always feeling superior to something. And out of this feeling of superiority it expands the forces of its astral body, broadens and puffs them up. Strictly speaking this is what is really at the root of laughter.

And this is why laughter can be such a healthy thing. And this pluming oneself should not be condemned in the abstract as egoistic, for laughter can be very healthy when it strengthens Man's feeling of selfhood, especially if it is warranted and leads him beyond himself. If you see something in your surroundings or in yourself or others that is absurd, a feeling of being above such absurdity is sparked off and makes you laugh. It is bound to happen that Man feels superior to something or other in the environment, and the I brings this to expression by expanding the astral body.

quote B

Now we shall see much more in the phenomena of laughing and weeping if we observe the breathing process when people laugh or cry. This enables us to see deeply into what is happening.

If you watch the breathing of someone who is weeping, you will notice that it consists essentially of a long out-breath and a short in-breath. It is the opposite with laughing: a short out-breath and a long in-breath.

Thus the breathing process changes when the human being is under the influence of the phenomena we have been describing. And you only need a little imagination to find the reasons why this must be so.

In the phenomena of weeping the astral body is compressed by the I. This is like a squeezing out of the breath: a long out-breath.

In the phenomenon of laughing there is a slackening of the astral body. That is just as though you were to pump the air out of a certain space, rarefy the air, and the air whistles in. It is like this with the long in-breath when you laugh. Here, so to say, in the change in the breathing process we see the I at work within the astral body.

1910-02-03-GA059

In other lectures we have seen that the I not only works on the sentient soul, the intellectual soul and the consciousness soul, but through this work is itself made stronger and brought nearer fulfilment. Hence we can readily understand that laughing and weeping can be a means whereby the I can educate itself and further strengthen its powers. No wonder, then, that among the great sources of education for human development we rank those dramatic creations which stimulate the soul-forces that find expression in laughter and tears.

… Hence we can see how closely connected with human development are tragedy and comedy, when through artistic creations they come before our souls.

Anyone who can observe human nature in its smallest details will find that everyday experiences can lead to an understanding of the greatest facts. Artistic productions, for example, can make us see that in human life there is a kind of pendulum which swings to and fro between laughter and tears. The I can progress only by being in motion. If the pendulum were at rest, the I would not be able to expand or develop; it would succumb to inward death. It is right for human development that the I should be able to free itself through laughter and on the other hand to search for itself through tears. Certainly a balance between the two poles must be found: the I will find completion only in the balance, never in swinging to and fro between exaltation and despair. It will find itself only at the point of rest, which can swing over as easily to one extreme as to the other.

The human being must gradually become the guide and leader of his own development. If we understand laughter and tears, we can see them as revelations of the spirit, for a human being becomes transparent, as it were, if we know how in laughter he seeks an outward expression of inner liberation, while in tears he experiences an inner strengthening after the I has suffered a loss in the external world.

1911-02-26-GA127

The relationship of the I to the environment through sadness and laughter.

1921-06-12-GA302

There is a relationship between what stays in the stomach, what we cannot digest, what will not move appropriately from the stomach into the intestines, and that which saddens us.

When we experience something genuinely tragic, it literally has a hardening effect on our digestive system. Even if it is almost unnoticed, it is nevertheless true that inner sadness causes us to work against our digestive processes. It is analogous to the food lying in your stomach like a stone.

…

Laughter is actually a process that makes us organically healthy. It acts as a healthy, undisturbed digestive system.

Anger
1909-12-05-GA059

is on the mission of anger

1914-01-15-GA063

It has to go deep into the secrets of human being, if you can ask yourself: What makes a person angry?

Because he uses the powers bestowed upon him for his perfection in the wrong places!

What causes evil, is evil in the world?

Because of the fact that Man does not use the powers bestowed on him in a world suitable for these powers.

Humour
1920-04-29-GA301

The spirit-soul is more closely connected with the physical body than it is when we are in a neutral mood. A humorous attitude is an expansion of the soul and spirit, whereas a serious mood brings the spirit-soul aspect of human nature into closer contact with the physical body.

Jealousy
1910-11-26-GA125

When we attempt to fight against a tendency towards jealousy that arises from earlier incarnations, then such jealousy puts on a mask.

… And a different effect occurs which is a consequence of fighting against jealousy.

Characteristics which are fought against appear in different masks. And the jealousy against which we are fighting then frequently appears in life in the form that we feel greatly tempted to seek out the faults in other people and criticise them severely.

We can encounter people in life who always manage to find the faults and shadow sides of other people as if they had a certain clairvoyant power; and if we try to get to the bottom of this phenomenon the cause can be found in that jealousy has turned into severe criticism of others, and this appears to be a rather good characteristic to the people concerned.

It is good, they say, to draw attention to the existence of these bad characteristics.

But behind such censoriousness is nothing other than transformed, masked jealousy.

Lying
1906-06-02-GA094

The dim, dreamy life of many mediums is an analogous phenomenon. The medium invariably loses his orientation between these different worlds and is unable to distinguish the true from the false.

A lie in the physical world becomes an agent of destruction in the astral world. A lie is a murder in the astral world. This phenomenon is the origin of black magic.

The earthly commandment, Thou shalt not kill, may therefore be translated into Thou shalt not lie, in reference to the astral world.

The lie is nothing but a word, an illusion. It may do untold harm, but nothing is actually destroyed. In the astral world, every feeling, every idea is a visible form, a living force. The astral lie brings about an impact between the false and true forms, resulting in death.

1906-06-29-GA094

In occultism we say: Upon the physical plane a lie is a lie, but upon the astral plane it is a murder.

Matters namely stand as follows: Whenever you relate something, you produced the corresponding thought-form; but also the fact which you relate rays out a thought-form. If your thought-form corresponds with it and agrees with it, then the two forms flow together upon the astral plane and strengthen each other. You thus strengthen the life of the being you are talking about.

But in the case of an untruth the thought-form streaming out of your words does not correspond with that which goes out from the thing itself; the forms collide and destroy each other. An untruth, a lie, does have a life-destroying, killing effect on them.

To speak of morality in the occult meaning, does not mean to preach morality, but to establish it by facts pertaining to the higher worlds. Schopenhauer rightly said: It is easy to preach morals, but is difficult to establish morals.

1906-08-23-GA095

In occultism there is a saying which can now be made known: In the astral world, every lie is a murder.

The full significance of this saying can be appreciated only by someone who has knowledge of the higher worlds. How readily people say: “Oh, that is only a thought or a feeling; it exists only in the soul. To box someone's ears is wrong, but a bad thought does no harm.”

No proverb is more untrue than the one which says: “You don't have to pay for your thoughts.” Every thought and every feeling is a reality, and if I let myself think that someone is a bad man or that I don't like him, then for anyone who can see into the astral world the thought is like an arrow or thunderbolt hurled against the other's astral body and injuring it as a gunshot would.

I repeat: every thought and every feeling is a reality, and for anyone with astral vision it is often much worse to see someone harbouring bad thoughts about another than to see him inflicting physical harm. When we make this truth known we are not preaching morality but laying a solid foundation for it.

If we speak the truth about our neighbour, we are creating a thought which the seer can recognise by its colour and form, and it will be a thought which gives strength to our neighbour. Any thought containing truth finds its way to the being whom it concerns and lends him strength and vigour. If I speak lies about him, I pour out a hostile force which destroys and may even kill him. In this way every lie is an act of murder. Every spoken truth creates a life-promoting element; every lie, an element hostile to life. Anyone who knows this will take much greater care to speak the truth and avoid lies than if he is merely preached at and told he must be nice and truthful.

other translation

Every lie is murder in the astral world! - This is a very significant sentence, the importance of which can only be understood by those who have knowledge of the higher worlds. How lightly people speak: Oh, it is only a thought, a feeling, it remains in the soul; I must not give a slap in the face, but a bad thought does no harm. - There is no more untrue proverb than: Thoughts are duty-free, - for every thought, every feeling is a reality, and if I think someone is a bad person, or I do not love him, it is like an arrow, like a bolt of lightning, for him who can see into the astral world, which moves like a shotgun pellet against the astral body of the other and harms him. Every feeling, every thought is an entity, a form in the astral world, and for those who have insight into this world, it is often much worse to see when someone has a bad thought about his fellow human being than when he physically harms him. To make this truth known is to justify morality, not to preach it. If one speaks the truth about a person, a thought-form is formed which the seer can recognize by shape and color and which strengthens the life of his neighbour. The thought that contains a truth goes towards the entity to which it refers and promotes and enlivens it. So if I think a truth about my fellow human being, I strengthen his life; if I say a lie about him, I pour a hostile force onto him that has a destructive, even killing effect. Therefore, every lie is murder. Every truth forms a life-enhancing element, every lie a life-inhibiting element. He who knows this will be more careful with regard to truth and lies than he who is only preached to that he should always tell the truth nicely.

1906-09-04-GA095 - Q&A

   “Before the voice can speak in the presence of the Masters, it must have lost the power to wound.”

   From Light on the Path, by Mabel Collins.

When we send forth a loving thought, it creates a wonderfully beautiful thought-form, like a flower which gently opens and then surrounds the person to whom the thought applies. Anyone who thinks a thought full of hate creates a sharp-pointed angular form, closed at its apex, designed to wound. That which is here called “the Masters” is the divine voice which speaks in us. It speaks constantly, but we do not always allow it to emerge. The thought-form of love is open; hence the voice of the Masters can sound through it. But the closed thought-form of hate leaves the divine thought-form no way out, so that it has to remain unheard.

In the astral, a lie is a murder

Suppose I think the following thought: I met a man. A quite definite thought-form will be engendered by that. Now to someone else I say it again: I met a man. The same thought-form is again engendered. The two thought-forms meet and strengthen each other. But if I tell a lie and say: I did not meet a man—this engenders a thought-form opposed to the first. The result is an explosion in the astral body of the liar.

1913-01-23-GA246

A special chapter is the nature of lies. Untruthfulness plays a significant role in today's industrial and commercial life.

This was not the case a short time ago.

The essence of lying is as follows: What does a person want when he lies, consciously or unconsciously?

Everyone who lies wants to use the lie to develop a power that spiritualizes him. The Elohim gave man earthly life so that he could accomplish his mission.

Lucifer does not want people to go through life on earth. Lying is serving Lucifer: Tearing man away from earthly life into a spiritual realm, but into a Luciferian realm. Liars = swarmers; all this is Luciferian influence.

If the human being has been a liar in his past earthly life, in the first half of life between death and a new birth one sees how he becomes a servant of the Luciferic hosts.

People who have especially served the Luciferic hosts (who were liars) are those who become crass egoists. All egoism in later lives is prepared by lying in earlier lives. By putting himself out of the truth, man puts himself out of humanity. Karmically, egoism comes from lying. Speaking untruth about the higher worlds comes out of drunkenness from occultism.

GA125

When we succumb to lying, Ahriman is at work in our ether body

GA338

p242; however quote not found back in GA338

There is a certain gradation when it comes to lying. The churches come first, the press second and the politicians third. This is presented quite objectively and not out of emotion.

The enthusiasm to lie is caused by things that can only be obtained through education within the church (and similar hierarchies). The enthusiasm for lying in the press is caused by social conditions, and in politics lying is really only, I would say, a continuation in civilian life of what is quite natural in militarism - with which politics is closely connected: if you want to defeat an opponent, you have to deceive him.

But there it is method, whereas with the other two classes, with the press and the representatives of the creeds, it is the enthusiasm of lying.

These things are not radicalism when they are presented in this way; it is simply an objective fact. The bad thing lies in the fact that, because of people's prejudices, a large proportion of them do not yet realize that it is impossible to stand within the confessions and tell the truth.

Sneezing

1920-12-19-GA202

Now let us consider the human being from the opposite pole, that of the will.

When does the will present itself with particular clarity through what we do?

When we sneeze, let us say, we are also doing something, but we cannot, surely, ascribe to ourselves any definite impulse of will when we sneeze!

When we speak, we are doing something in which will is undoubtedly contained. But think how, in speaking, deliberate intent and absence of intent, volition and absence of volition, intermingle. You have to learn to speak, and in such a way that you are no longer obliged to formulate each single word by dint of an effort of will; an element of instinct enters into speech. In ordinary life at least, it is so, and it is emphatically so in the case of those who do not strive for spirituality.

Garrulous people, who are always opening their mouths in order to say something or other in which very little thought is contained, give others an opportunity of noticing—they themselves, of course, do not notice—how much there is in speech that is instinctive and involuntary.

But the more we go out beyond our organic life and pass over to activity that is liberated, as it were, from organic processes, the more do we carry thoughts into our actions and deeds.

Sneezing is still entirely a matter of organic life; speaking is largely connected with organic life; walking really very little; what we do with the hands, also very little. And so we come by degrees to actions which are more and more emancipated from our organic life. We accompany such actions with our thoughts, although we do not know how the will streams into these thoughts. If we are not somnambulists and do not go about in this condition, our actions will always be accompanied by our thoughts. We carry our thoughts into our actions, and the more our actions evolve towards perfection, the more are our thoughts being carried into them.

1924-06-25-GA279

If you enter into the intimate nature of the different sounds, you will, in the case of c, have much the same feeling as if in a circus you saw weights,—apparently made of iron and marked so and so many hundredweight,—lifted up quickly and easily by the clown. Imagine that you were to approach such a weight, in the belief that it were made of iron and immensely heavy, and that you were to lift it up. You would approach it, and in suddenly raising it, you would produce a movement very similar to the sound c.

We have the same thing in Nature; for sneezing is not at all unlike a c. Sneezing is a lightening process.

It was said by the old occultists that the sound c in primeval language was the Regent of Health. And in Austria, when a person sneezes, we still have a saying: Zur Gesundheit (Your very good health).

These are feelings which must be taken into consideration when studying the sounds, otherwise we shall not be able to come to any understanding of them in their reality.

Coughing

1920-03-22-GA312

Let us take the most frequent symptoms of an individual who is an incipient tuberculous case. Tuberculosis is in his future, and his present state prepares for it. We find perhaps that he coughs, feels pain in the throat and chest, and perhaps also in his limbs; there will be certain states of exhaustion and fatigue; and there will be profuse sweating at night.

If we take all these symptoms together what do they mean? They are, first of all, the effect of those internal irregular interactions to which I have referred. And at the same time, they represent the resistance offered by the organism, its struggles against the deeper foundation of the disease. Let us take the simpler manifestations first. It is certainly not always and under all circumstances beneficial to attempt to stop a cough. It may even sometimes be necessary to stimulate coughing by artificial means.

If the lower organic sphere cannot be controlled by the upper, the healthy reaction manifests as the irritation leading to coughing, in order to prevent the invasion of certain things which are undesirable. To suppress coughing as an invariable rule, may be deleterious, for the body will then absorb injurious substances. Coughing is the attempt to get rid of such substances, which cannot be tolerated under the prevailing conditions. Thus the tickling irritation which provokes coughing is a danger signal of something which is wrong in the organism, so that the need arises to repel the invaders, which could otherwise easily effect an entry.

What of the other symptoms, enumerated above? They too are forms of organic defence, ways of doing battle with the dangers which approach as the tubercular tendency. The pains in the throat and limbs simply proclaim the obstruction of those processes in the lower sphere, which are not adequately controlled by the upper. If the tubercular tendency is perceived in good time, it may be beneficial to support the resistant organism by moderate stimulation of the coughing, by stimulating the resultant phenomena—as will be indicated in the subsequent lectures—by appropriate diet, and even by stimulating the typical fatigue. Again, if there is marked emaciation, this too is only a form of organic defence. For if this emaciation does not take place, the process which develops is perhaps that activity of the lower sphere which the upper cannot control. The organism dwindles and loses weight, in order to defend itself by getting rid of those elements which cannot be controlled by the upper sphere. [and cont'd]

1923-04-14-GA349

But now I want to tell you something else that shows you that there is also a great difference between the higher animals and between man in regard to everything that belongs to this head and this whole organization.

You have probably already encountered this somewhat unpleasant disease in children, which is called whooping cough; in some areas it is called spasmodic cough. Actually, whooping cough is not so bad for a child at that age, because it usually goes away. The bad thing is what remains if you don't behave properly – that is, the doctors or whoever is responsible – while whooping cough is there. That's when the following can happen.

What does whooping cough consist of?

Whooping cough consists in the fact that the inhalation always remains proper – you can have a child with whooping cough as severe as you like: it breathes in properly; you can see that when you examine the matter – but when the air wants to come out again when you breathe out, it gets stuck, it doesn't come out properly again, and that's when the coughing fit comes. And because the air cannot come out properly, no fresh air can come in, and that is how whooping cough occurs; that is what it consists of.

But what is the underlying cause of whooping cough in children?

You see, the underlying cause is that the inner mucous membrane of the respiratory system, of these tubes that go in and out of the lungs, becomes terribly sensitive.

When the air goes in, it also goes out over the sensitive areas, because the chest is empty inside, and you can always pour air into the void. You only have to think of the air pump. The air pump consists of having a glass dome here (it is drawn); you pump the air out of it. Now it is empty of air. Then you can have an opening to support it. If you now take out the plug, the air rushes in with a whistle. There is no need for anything else under the glass cover but empty space. When we have exhaled, there is airless space in our lungs; so the air rushes in by itself. There is nothing special to be done to get the air in. So it is no wonder that air rushes in through the sensitive windpipe, because the air does not feel it. But if you want to get the air out of the air pump again, you have to do something, you have to pump it out.

Likewise, you have to push out the air that is inside the lungs. Now, however, the child's respiratory tubes have become sensitive. They are just as sensitive as if they were scratched somewhere. So the inside of the respiratory tubes is a little scratched, they are sensitive.

Instead of the act of the will, which drives the air out and expels the air, it scratches the windpipe, and instead of expelling the air, it is concerned with scratching the sensitive spot. You see, while the child wants to scratch, it forgets to expel the air, and then the air stops inside. Then come these fits of whooping cough. Then the body wants to forcefully expel the air, while in life what I recently called the astral body expels the air. You can tell exactly where the physical body is and where the astral body is by looking at a child with spasmodic coughing.

  • When the child does not have spasmodic coughing, the astral body expels the air; the body is not bothered at all.
  • If it is whooping cough, there is a sensitive spot. The astral body wants to scratch away; the physical body first has to come into action and has to expel the air spasmodically. This can even cause a spasm, and from that a secondary illness can arise.

So you see, it is not at all the case that one can say that the physical body does everything. Then one can never understand whooping cough.

When someone has whooping cough, something strange is going on. One has to ask: what has actually happened to his astral body?

His astral body has become headless, namely, like the other part of the astral body in the frog! As the frog wets its leg, so the astral body wets the air pipes internally, and the physical body then has to get rid of the air. So you can distinguish this quite precisely.

Various

1912-02-03-GA143

Conscience and Astonishment (As Indications of Spiritual Vision in Past and Future)

Discussion

Related pages

References and further reading

  • Robert J. Sardello:
    • 'Facing the world with soul - The Reimagination of Modern Life' (1974 in EN, also in NL as 'De ziel in de wereld : Een andere, spirituele benadering van het dagelijks leven')
    • The Power of Soul: Living the Twelve Virtues (2002)

Nervousness

  • Michael Rogers: 'How to overcome nervousness' (1973)
  • Jaap van de Weg: 'Nervositeit' (1990)
  • Olaf Koob: 'Das verletzte Gemüt : Ursachen und Behandlung von Nervosität, Hyperaktivität und Aufmerksamkeitsstörungen ; Salutogenetische Aspekte zur Situation der Gegenwart' (2003)
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