THE BEACON MAGAZINE

Learning to think requires knowing what one thinks—what one’s viewpoint or perception on a particular problem or issue is. And for many people that is enough. Having evaluated a particular situation, the mind reaches a conclusion and formulates a response which becomes anchored in the brain. There it stays until dislodged by a new and more comprehensive thoughtform.

Everywhere today there are groups of people forming to accomplish some particular aim or other. In every case, certain laws of group endeavour begin to take their toll on the group’s ability to function. This process will continue until the group expires without fulfilling its work, or until it achieves its goals.

As our identification with the whole is made via the antahkarana, a renunciation of the lower has occurred. We have sacrificed our life as we have known it for a greater purpose, and the Tibetan tells us spiritual will brings revelation of purpose. He also tells us that through sacrifice "we choose to die". But there is no real death; as Matthew 10-39 says, "He that looseth his life for My sake shall find it unto life eternal."

Given that the antahkarana, once completed, is revelatory in nature, Jung’s work on the symbolism of the mandala as an aspect of the alchemical process is of note, for it becomes possible to consider the antahkarana as a type of mandala. Jung states that "the true mandala is always an inner image, which is gradually built up through active imagination, which contains a "traditional structure", and which "are all based on a quaternary system", and are described as "mental images". It is thus of interest that the Tibetan’s symbol for the achieved duality inherent in the completed construction of the antahkarana is that of a vertical line enclosed within a circle—a common feature of mandalas.

It is only when we become conscious wielders of our own energy that we can begin to act as connections in the circuit between the whole and the part, the group and the individual. We are now engaged in the effort of contacting those previously unrealised higher aspects of our Selves in order to invoke the flow of the spiritual energy of the One Life and to enable it to pass actively through us and into the world of manifestation.

Before the teaching of the antahkarana can become really significant, men must realise the possibility of achieving a state of consciousness far beyond anything at present experienced, and must take at least the preliminary steps toward establishing a path of return between two worlds: finite minds must touch the divine mind and chart the road it follows in so doing. The awareness of reality has to be brought into purposeful expression within the sphere of man’s normal, waking consciousness.

It is pleasing to read of their love for each other; their compatibility, sharing of goals and their sheer joy. It was truly heaven-sent to find such a meshing of the thinking and purposes of this great mind and his exceptional young wife.