“If you want to develop as a Spiritualist medium, a spirit communicator, or simply a quester on the road to cosmic consciousness, the first thing you need to do is relax, the second thing is get out of your own way, and the third is listen.”
Patrick Young, a British medium resident in Vancouver, British Columbia, used to drill that message into our ears. Some people in the development circle quit, but others persevered.
The first step was easy. Meditation, self-hypnosis, bio-feedback, conscious relaxation, all provide that required state of altered consciousness. But “get out of your own way”? That was something else. Puzzled, I delved into the ancient teachings of the Sufis, the mystical wool-gathers of Islam, Gurdjieff and Ouspensky, Yogi philosophy, Jean Klein, Vernon Howard, and discovered awareness.
Awareness is a state that comes through meditation. You commence to look at things differently. You change your window on the world, but more importantly, you change the window on yourself. It’s all part of that gem from the Temple at Delphi, Greece, and Socrates: “Know Thyself.” Jesus the Teacher put it another way: “You shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.”
Awareness? If this seems difficult, have someone quietly video tape you the next time you’re doing something negative--arguing with a relative at a family picnic or attempting to discipline an unruly child. Something emotional. Then, when all is quiet, and you are alone, take a look at the video. The feelings, the reaction you experience will be quite different from your usual self. As you watch you may experience feelings of embarrassment, anger, guilt, hurt, and yes, resentment towards the person who took the video. Carefully observe yourself and the feelings that pass.
You’ll see many of the different faces of your conditioned mind. Your life environment has trained you to respond in those ways. They are not the real you, the true spiritual you. They are the false self, the adopted self which has learned to put on many faces, including fear, anger, indignation, bitterness, jealousy, guilt, revenge and many more. Think for a moment: Do you really need any of these faces?
When you become aware of the false self, the negative self, it is tantamount to shining the light on the things holding you back. All the great teachers and religions have taught this. Hinduism: Discover your true self; George Gurdjieff: Wake up!; the Christian New Testament: Be born again; Zen: Let the mind be silent; Buddhism: Abandon egotism; Mysticism: See things as they really are.
This process changes your level of consciousness, raises your vibration. Becoming aware is only part of the task of allowing the real self to surface. Work to be aware without judging, without expressing an opinion, without criticism, without comment--nothing. Just be aware. Cast the light of awareness on a negative, and mentally watch what happens.
As you practice your meditation in preparation for unfoldment, and work on your awareness, you will find yourself “getting out of your own way,” and when you start to receive messages or information from Spirit teachers and others, you will enjoy an expanded consciousness and the beautiful qualities that are part of it: a growing self confidence, right thinking and a growing unconditional love of self. Awareness helps you to stop identifying yourself with the negative self.
As my old medium teacher said so long ago, “listen.” It is imperative that students listen with an open mind. The critical thing about modern Spiritualism is that the messages need to be accurate. If one’s mind is cluttered with countless mind-chatters, if one’s mind carries negative bias, negative opinions, hurts and fears, chances are the faces of the false self will reflect on the accuracy of those messages.
As the M.H. and E.W. Wallis wrote in great book A Guide to Mediumship, “When we hold aloft the lamp of knowledge we fearlessly tread the path.” More, as Hudson Tuttle states in Mediumship and Its Laws,” The medium who is unbiased in his own mind cannot be lead away from right-doing by the influence of mortals or spirits.”
Some people may scoff at the idea that their subconscious mind or the ego-self will interfere in the spirit accuracy of message process. Really? Little voices from our past continue to prompt our actions every minute of every hour of every day. Unchecked, unrecognized they can and will influence spirit communications. For instance, I once knew a student medium who would not pass on any message that was not “Christian,” and anything that was not “positive.” A well intended person, her bias undermined her efforts. Problem was we had two Buddhists and a Sikh in the small development group.
Imagine the old Western Union telegraph system where the well-intended operator changed the message between the sender and the receiver. It would create chaos, disbelief, and accusations of fraud, among other things.
And remember, whenever a medium is working, he or she is always under investigation.
Daniel Day Walton, who was on the executive of the American Society for Psychical Research in the 1930s said: “The practice of mediumship is a rough path to tread, and a dangerous one....”the medium must not only struggle with the unknown personal strains and stresses that accompany production of phenomena, but when submitting to investigation by scientists and others of inquiring mind, he must run the danger of misrepresentation, misinterpretation and dishonesty in conducting or reporting the experiments.”
Then, on top of that, one has “the unlovely aspects of human nature--bias, prejudice, selfish aims and ulterior motives quite unrelated to the supposed ends of scientific investigation.”
That’s why it is important to get out of your own way, get the so-called coloring out of your messages, and allow accuracy to prevail.
The way to unfoldment and mediumistic training is through a Home Circle, normally of seven to nine people. Described as “The Soul and Salvation of Spiritualism,” and under the tutorage of a good medium-teacher on the Earth Plane, and a Control or Spirit-Teacher from the Other Side, the dedicated student will find the correct path to developing the latent powers of mediumship. The advantage in the Home Circle is students have the benefit of getting personal attention by the medium.
The student who is not 100% positive about mediumship and may lack self-motivation and perhaps, self-confidence, may find development in an Organized Group or Circle, normally held in a Church, a club room, or a large private home. Here the group or class may be up to thirty strong, and the teachings and training will be close to that of the Home Circle, but the individual attention can be missing.
There is another way--independent study, and the student here must set up his or her own study program. While it allows great freedom of choice, it does lack the inter-action by (1) a good and experienced medium-teacher, and (2) group expressions.
It’s wise to be familiar and understand the Natural Laws that govern mediumship. These are the Laws of Attraction, Control, Vibration, Cause and Effect, Order, Harmony, Compensation and the Law of Mediumship. Millions of folk the world over have mediumistic abilities, and are unaware because they know nothing about the Laws governing Mediumship. This is like a man or a woman going about their lives unable to speak because they didn’t know they could, or couldn’t see because they didn’t know how to open their eyes.
And yes, wherever you develop, and whatever path you take, Spirit helpers, Spirit Teachers are there standing by to assist. You will attract the right spirits into your life, depending on how you work those Natural Laws of Attraction and Vibration.
It might sound crude, but one thing not many Spiritualists promote to upcoming students, is this: “Shop around for a good medium-teacher. Take a look at students, now mediums, assisted by the medium- teacher. ” When you find a medium-teacher that feels right for you, and your intuition (plus spirits) will help you, lock on to him or her. They’re worth their weight in gold--spiritual gold that is. There are some great mediums who are poor teachers, and there are some brilliant teachers who are poor mediums. And there are some who are very good at mediumship and teaching. Be guided by your higher awareness, your own spirit, your true self.
If you spot a medium-teacher, and those little voices pipe up: “We don’t like his face,” or “She’s cute,” or “He’s a disciplinarian. I’m not going to like him,” or “She doesn’t look like a medium,” recognize it for what it is, that old, conditioned ego-self. Recognize that you are still standing in your own light.
Make a commitment to get out of your own way. You’ll be glad you did.
AUTHOR’S NOTE: This was an article written in 1999 that was the basis of my first book “Cracking the Glass Darkly,” which again was the predecessor of my second book “The Quest of the Radical Spiritualist,” both of which are available at most bookstores and Amazon.com under “Robert Egby”.
The Quest of the Radical Spiritualist