The Spiritual Con

 Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law.

The spiritual game is like a burglar robbing a building. When the police enter the front door, he goes up to the first floor. When they go up to the first, he goes up to the second and so on, until theoretically at least he must presumably get up to the roof. Our qabalistic system reflects this, our goal is always the next grade up. If I am a Neophyte, I want to become a Zelator. If a Zelator I want to become a Practicus and so on. The presumed spiritual self, the core of one's being, is the robber, always one floor up. The initiate is the police sent to root out the robber, who always seems just out of reach, whenever you make it onto the next floor, there you are, and no robber in sight, he's gone up a level! 

We play this endless game with ourselves, and granted, we find some interesting things on each floor, some have fantastic views. Occasionally we think we get a glimpse of the robber as he disappears up the stairs. He may even leave a note, “you can’t catch me, but keep trying, just a little further”. For the most part, this game is an internalisation of the games we usually play in the world. The spiritual game is largely a sublimation, rather than a new activity.

If we look in other areas of life, we can see that we are always trying to play the robber to somebody else, we are always trying to get something. For some the prize is a new car, a high level job, fame and fortune, for others the prize is something hard to pin down but still just another prize; the knowledge and conversation of the Holy Guardian Angel, enlightenment, siddhis, and so on. However, if we conduct our inner life as if we were out to get something then this is just an elaborate way of moving in circles. We don't really want to grow beyond ourselves, we just want to expand our idea of ourselves, make ourselves more real by adding a sublimated dimension, which we call our spiritual practice.

In social life, and the day-to-day life of business and work, this need to get ahead is always there. Except that there is more than one cop after the robber, we always want to be ahead of the other guy, to get the prize that he is too slow to get, we want to be the one that's 'got it'. Sometimes we behave as a competitor, sometimes a teacher, posing as guide or sage, demonstrating our wisdom or power, as one who inhabits the next floor up from others and therefore entitled to be listened to and respected. As somebody who has in the past had ‘students’ in the A\A\, I became aware of this tendency in myself and others; the need to always be one step ahead, just a bit more enlightened, a bit wiser than the student, have a closer link to the founder of the order, and thus superior, closer to getting the robber than they, always just ahead.

In the moral realm the same thing happens and is often mixed in with spirituality. Are liberal Christians better than conservative? My church is more accepting than yours, or more traditional, more 'old school', or closer to the original gospel, are common examples. In my foray's into the Catholic faith I noticed a strong tendency for self identified 'traditional Catholics' to criticize more liberal 'cafeteria Catholics' as being half baked and probably going to hell, while in turn being criticized for being hidebound by tradition and removed from the gospel. In Buddhism it is well known that each sect regards itself as superior for having a certain view. Mahayana is criticized by Hinayana adherents for its use of teachings other than those of the first Buddha, and Hinayana is often viewed negatively by Mahayana proponents with their sophisticated developments of the basic doctrine. Within our own system similar things happen: my lineage is purer than yours, has a more direct line to Aleister Crowley, or more 'orthodox', or conversely, my lineage might not have a clear paper trail, but we are the more accepting, the more liberal, less judgmental, or closer to the original ideals of the Great White Brotherhood. Claims to greater orthodoxy, greater originality, greater progressiveness, or more stringent examinations and testing criteria, or simply of being more serious Thelemites, all are really just ways of 'getting ahead' of the others, it's a con that we play on each other, and on ourselves. 

There is also the 'purity of aspiration' trap: as a purely ‘spiritual’ practitioner am I really any better than the guy who tries to use magic for material gain? In reality I and the guy using magic for material ends are really playing the same game in different arenas, trying in our way, to get ahead of the competition, to win prizes. We are always trying to be better, in some way, than the other guy.

While we often don't like to admit it, we think we are better than non practitioners because we play a spiritual game rather than a material one, we criticize materialists and those whose primary concerns are comfort in life. We have tried to go one floor up, like robbers, from Assiah to Yetzirah, from Yetzirah to Briah and so on. Really we are just playing the same old game of one-upmanship.

How then to undo this? I don’t think you can really, if you try to then you are liable to fall into yet another trap, the trap of being the most down to earth, grounded, rational and non-game-playing, then you start saying all sorts of terrible things about those who still appear to be playing the game of cops and robbers, and are therefore still inferior to you. It seems like a clever strategy, but once you've seen the robber in the mirror, it's hard to un-see it, and you realise that you can neither advance or retreat, and standing still isn't a possibility either. Deliberately remaining aloof from the game can also be no more than another game if we do it deliberately so as to not play the game, that is to say, if we do it with the objective of improving ourselves in our own or the eyes of others. The movement must be spontaneous, something that you can't get by trying.

 Having been 'on the path' now for while I am more than familiar with all of the tricks. I’ve used a good many of them myself, and probably still do. Even my pointing out how we are all hopelessly lost in this game could simply be another attempt to one-up the competition with my apparent self-awareness. There does seem to be a gap, a way out, action that is non-action, what Castaneda called 'not-doing', and the Taoists call 'Wu wei'. But how to practice this? Paradoxically, there are methods, or habits to acquire. I am still very much a beginner in this myself, but I hope to write a little about it in future posts.

Love is the law, love under will.