Lesson 1
This is the start of a new School. We have had many requests to have a School, one where people come to a given place, live and work together for many months and constantly being exposed to certain ideas, ideas which are a study of man. Finding that many people from many different areas wish to attend these Schools and that it is very inconvenient and very expensive and sometimes almost impossible for people to disrupt their homes, businesses and jobs for many months to attend one of these Schools. After much, much effort and quite a considerable amount of study and experimentation we have decided to put “the School” on — recorded on cassette tapes. No one will be standing over you. Will you please use the tapes as they are designed so you may receive the maximum benefit and the maximum value from the tapes. Each tape is numbered. There is no specific name or title to each tape. They are numbered from 1 to 48. Each tape is to be used for one week. It was suggested that you listen to the tape at least once each day and that you very carefully consider the material that is covered on the tape and that you attempt to observe it in your affairs, in your everyday existence. The only thing that is different when a school is put on and people come to one given place is that they are constantly reminded of what they are doing. There are constantly pointed out certain ideas that may be used for observation. These ideas will be pointed out to you day by day and week by week. In 48 weeks, if you’ve used the tapes according to the instructions, you will find that there is a complete transformation in your state of being.
Now the usual study of man, which has been undertaken for centuries, is that man is divided into various aspects. His physiology is studied and there is considerable literature on his physiology, the internal function of the human body. This is very, very valuable but it is isolated as the study of the body and does not take into consideration what is going on in either his structure or most especially his inner state, his psyche, his soul, his spirit. These are interchangeable words. There are spiritual studies but they have gradually deteriorated into “observing the behavior” and trying to fit certain behavior and avoid certain other behavior. In other words, there is an attempt to be what’s called “good,” that one would be kind and considerate etc. However, there is much in man that is not brought to light and is not studied and so in spite of his attempts to do these, he seldom if ever succeeds. If he does succeed he is in somewhat of a turmoil within and really hasn’t succeeded; he’s only been conditioned to be good. His structure is studied and great works of anatomy are performed and are very valuable for surgery but they give one little if any understanding of what’s happening to the structure in everyday affairs of aging, aches and pains, distortions etc.
Now the necessity for a School, so that you will know that you have a School and that you are in a School and that you have all the requirements of a School as if it were away in some hidden area in the California desert or in the mountains of Idaho or in some valley in New Mexico or in some other area. These are the necessary things for a School: That one has a Teaching or a set of ideas that put light on our inner states, our spiritual being, it gives a spiritual interpretation of all events both inner and outer. Obviously, all of these ideas will not be given at once. They are given one at a time and one observes for self to see if these ideas are true. Nothing is to be accepted because you hear it on a tape or because you hear it in person. One is to investigate, observe by careful observation, repeatedly, to observe that the ideas are factual, or if they are not, discard them. Don’t discard them at the first moment — continue a little bit.
The first necessity of a school is a given set of ideas which no man claims credit for having originated. They have been around a very long time. Various persons may carry these ideas and share them with others, but the ideas are what are worthwhile not the person who carries those ideas. In this usual terminology we say it is the contents that are worthwhile not the container. So whether your container is a cassette tape, some person or whatever, it is the ideas that count not the person or the means by which you receive them or the channels through which you receive the ideas. So the ideas will put a light, a spiritual interpretation, on all the events that one experiences in the various relationships of everyday existence.
The second thing is that there are two or more people in a relationship. This may be work, home, play, or whatever; that there are two or more people in relationship. Only one of these needs to know about the ideas. That is you. Please do not try to force the ideas on anyone else. They are to be used as an Inner Light, not to be taught to other people, forced upon them or anything. If they ever ask, and much later down the way you will be given instructions that you may be aware, you will then be able to check it out if the person is really wanting to be a student and study or whether they are merely curious. So at first there are two or more people, any number of them, maybe fifty where you work or it may be a large family or it may be some kind of public service, civic work, whatever and wherever. You will probably have many relationships. Whatever relationships one finds ones self in one has something to observe there, and the ideas of the Teaching throws lights on it so that you may understand what’s going on in the inner man, the inner state, ones state of being.
So there’s two or more people in relationship. There’s nobody so isolated that you do not have some other person that you have some relationship, work, play, home, whatever, everyday. This work is not for hermits. Only one of the people need be acquainted with the ideas. In fact, sometimes it is better that only one be acquainted with it, you. One who has the ideas is observing and all the others are going merrily on their way totally unaware that you are doing the observing. That one must be using the Teaching for self, at least part of the time. Teaching that is not used is, of course, without any value whatsoever.
Some of the ideas of The Science of Man for study and experimentation, at this moment they will only be worthwhile as something to study, to be aware of and that there is a different set of ideas. You will be given specific assignments, specific bits of work and specific ways of observing these various ideas from time to time. So don’t be in a hurry. Haste makes waste as the old saying goes. Slowly, methodically and carefully proceed on one’s way. One is traveling over a very new road and to you it sometimes may seem rocky or bumpy at first, however very shortly it will be a very delightful way.
Some of the ideas of the School are: That man or woman in everyday life have never studied or been exposed or had the opportunity to use the various ideas that throw light on the spiritual aspect of man and his relationship between his psychology, his physiology, his structure and his biology. That that person without that understanding or not having that opportunity is mechanical. Now anything mechanical does not have a will of its own, it does not have a determination of its own. It is purely subject to what happens to it. Your automobile may be sitting in the street washed, shined, motor tuned, everything in perfect shape, but it has no will as to whether it will go or sits. Turn the key and it performs the way it was equipped to perform — what it was designed for. A human being may be in such a state that anyone can push a button and cause them to be angry, or cause them to work or cause them to agree with many ideas which will possibly lead them into a state of slavery sooner or later, a state of dependency on something else. Further, when the car is just sitting in the street and something bumps it, it is all bent out of shape. We might say that when we become angry, worried, excited, frightened, resentful, bashful, jealous etc., that we are bent out of shape. We are far from being happy and pleased within self or being conscious. We did not choose this state, it happened to us, and in that state we are mechanical. The first thing that we will observe is that we don’t choose our states.
So right here you may take a piece of paper and write down the various things that you see all this week, day after day, as you listen to the tapes. Observe what goes on in relationships, how many times one behaves mechanically. You might say we have buttons out. Somebody comes along and pushes a button and I’m angry; somebody else comes along and pushes a button and I’m very delighted; somebody else pushes a button and I feel annoyed or aggravated or I’m upset in some other way. Now we didn’t choose to be this way, it just happened. Obviously, none of us would choose to be upset. We would choose to be peaceful and serene. But we then notice that we are not that way much of the time. Maybe we go along several days and everybody is pushing the proper button and I feel very delighted. But sooner or later in relationship, somebody forgets, somebody moves something that I left in a certain place, somebody says, “Why are you doing that?” Somebody forgets to do what they said they would do. Let’s observe the mechanical reaction. Those are just a little samples of the way to push buttons.
The second idea of the School, that as well as man being mechanical, that he is 100% subject to suggestion 100% of the time. For a suggestion to work it must be based upon something that is the prime form within man, his frame of reference. Very early in our existence, possible almost at the moment of birth, we formed a fundamental conclusion that the whole purpose of living is to regain the non-disturbed state by gaining pleasure and escaping pain. Most of us have never consciously thought of that. As we observe again, along with observing how much we are mechanical, we will observe that we are always looking for comfort and pleasure on all levels and struggling to avoid pain on all levels. We’ll take up the various levels from time to time. So you might say this is a program, to use present day computer language, that one is programmed and then anything that does not bring about pleasure or comfort one reacts to and anything that brings about pain one reacts to. So all suggestion either holds out that one will have pleasure and comfort in the future or will experience pain in the future if one does not do so-and-so. By observing this we will begin to observe the suggestion that we are 100% subject to suggestion 100% of the time. In other words, we always hear it. If we have not examined self and are unaware of this basic value, this basic programming that the whole purpose of living is to regain the non-disturbed state we will find that we are not only subject to suggestion but that we are controlled by suggestion very frequently if not 100% of the time. So to leave our self a little bit of leeway we will say almost all the time.
Let’s write it down and see how often “I” read a newspaper article that says some terrible catastrophe is going to occur and that I feel upset. I may read of a flu epidemic or some other form of epidemic is coming across the country and become concerned. If it threatens, see if we feel a moment of urgency of one form or another. As long as this is unexamined it will continue. So we will start examining, where I hear suggestions. Remember that suggestions always offers a reward for a certain line of behavior or thought or belief and that to fail to have that particular line of thought or behavior or belief, one is threatened with a loss. All of these are suggestions so you may be aware of them. We may read that cancer is rampant, or that heart conditions claim many lives, and we might begin to feel our pulse or examine our skin or feel the body to see if we might find a lump somewhere. If we do we find some sort of sudden excitement, a sense of urgency. This, of course, has its effect on the physiology, on the anatomy and it certainly has its effect on the biology of the body. So much of it stops if we begin to observe, not from something that slips up and attacks us, but for something that arises in the very inner man, the spirit of man, the soul, or the psyche. Today we generally use the word psychology. Sometime ago it was “soul” in the English translation and that is an exact translation of the Greek word “psyche,” which, of course, is where the word psychology comes from.
We might notice, and it is a tenet of the Teaching, that every suggestion that was accepted, uncritically, just accepted because it sounded true, that each of those suggestions becomes a separate personality. We will use the terminology a “Not-I” for a false personality. I’m sure everyone is acquainted with the story of Pinocchio. A man carved out a wooden doll and due to some reason or other the wooden doll suddenly became alive, ran off on its own and caused all manner of mischief. So we each have many, many Pinocchio’s or “Not-I’s.” We formed them by agreeing to a suggestion. They stayed, they grew, they multiplied and they have became quite powerful and they go their own way and one at a time take over and run the affairs of this household called I, the self. We all think that each of these I’s is one and the same. The School Teaching says they are separate personalities, and as we proceed we’ll find they are in various parties and certain ones cooperate and other certain ones cooperate in another camp and possibly that everyone of them only has only one real purpose in mind, destroy the living being.
The next idea of the School is that man feels he has rights and that he must stick up for these rights and that he blames everything that, to him, seems to prevent him from having these rights. Of course, the rights come from the idea of having had something a number of times and then we feel we are entitled to it. We possible feel that the whole world, as we observe, it will come to light, we feel we are the center of the universe and that everybody ought to spend their entire time taking care of my rights. I have them, they should get out of the way, should do what they are supposed to do when their supposed to. Of course, if we want to consider rights for a moment we might consider how we came into this earth world, naked, broke, helpless, didn’t even understand the language, didn’t know what we really needed, and maybe we still don’t. We found everything provided for us and we managed to grow up to our present state of affairs and we didn’t bring a thing to insure that. We didn’t even know how to ask. Wonder if we have any rights or have we had a lot of privileges a number of times? When something is given to us over and over, we begin to accept it as a right and feel entitled to it.
On another sheet of paper put at the top of it: My rights. As you find yourself talking to self or talking to someone else and defending a certain right or claiming a certain right, “Well I have the right to do this and I have a right to have this,” write it down. On the other side of the paper write down: I obtained this right by, and put down what gave it to you, how you earned it.
Anything that is given to us is a privilege and, of course, can be taken away regardless of whether it’s called a right or not. Anything that I have formed a title to, earned, may be a right. So lets begin to see what we really have rights to. Anything that can be taken away from you is not necessarily a right, is it? You will notice one thing. In the Teaching of School ideas specific meanings are put on many words. These will be brought to attention and used wherever possible.
NOT-I: Anything that resulted from a suggestion that has been accepted and acted upon and thought to be true and it now is a personality going on its own.
RIGHTS: Something that cannot be taken away from you.
Even life can be taken away from us by most anyone with a hammer, gun, knife, poison etc. So maybe life is a privilege and maybe driving is a privilege. Maybe the greatest way in the world to lose privileges is to mistake them for rights and start sticking up for them. If we saw something was a privilege we would expend a certain amount of effort, attention and thought to have that privilege. We would make every effort to maintain the privileges we now have, to enhance them and possibly to even gain more. So it might be very interesting, if in observing what we consider to be our rights, we notice that most of them are privileges and what have I really done to maintain that privilege, to enhance it and to gain others.
Another idea of the School is that man has emotions of anger, guilt, fear, inferiority, insecurity and their many subdivisions like jealousy, envy, resentment, all of which man was never designed to have and they are therefore STRESS to him. When he has stress, there are many adaptations to stress that are disintegrating. These basic emotions of anger, guilt, fear, insecurity, jealousy, envy and all their synonyms and subdivisions are not proper to man. He was never designed to have them. They are due to his conditioning, to his basic conclusion that the purpose of living is to be non-disturbed, to the many suggestions as to what is to blame, how to do etc. These basic emotions bring into being a state of being called greed, vanity and pride.
GREED is defined as wanting more, better and different. No matter what one has, after a little while, even though one is very delighted with it to begin with, one grows weary and tired of it or one begins to take it for granted. One begins to accept that one is entitled to it and wants more, better and different.
VANITY is all the Not-I’s having a false picture of oneself as always being in the right, being a very wonderful person that is mistreated.
PRIDE is defending that false picture of self.
Take care to DO THE WORK. To only hear the words, even if you listen to them every hour, would do nothing. If one applies and does the work one will find many great things.
Copyright © 1973 by Rhondell. All rights reserved. This material is for an individual student’s personal use; it is not to be duplicated or loaned to another.
