Persist

“Spiritual awakening” might seem like a rather unappetising goal for most people when weighed against material success and pleasure. But those material successes and material pleasures aren’t going to help us on ‘the other side’. Once we move beyond the veil, diametrically opposite standards and conditions apply, as (of course) we no longer possess any physicality.

Spiritual awareness is the act of being consciously aware of our spiritual essence. It is the difficult task of understanding we have an immortal self which continues beyond the death of the temporary vehicle we occupy for a lifetime. But if we can obtain some level of spiritual awareness, interesting things can happen for us. Things which might make us reconsider the value or goal of ‘material success’ which is programmed into us from birth.

There is a method available for obtaining spiritual ‘awareness’ or ‘enlightenment’, or at minimum a far higher level of perception of the nature of reality, but this method requires us to break through the built-in barriers of our physical body design. [For an explanation of the built-in barriers of our body design, see the blog Body Design]

The method is very simple: Persistence.

The search for spiritual awakening usually starts after an event ‘triggers’ a desire to ‘wake up’. It might be the death of a loved one or perhaps some personal challenge that besets us. Or maybe it was pre-programmed into us at a specific time in our lives as an ‘alarm wake-up call’. Whatever the trigger is, it brings into question our comfort in the material environment we have grown used to.

This awakening is not about adding additional philosophies to our life, but about stripping away all the obstructions and false hoods that interfere with our ability to connect with our spiritual essence or ‘Higher Self’. The path is subtractive. We have to let go of all sorts of mental garbage, even stuff which appears precious to us.

At some point along the way, we will achieve a break through, a moment of ‘truth’ when our understanding of the nature of reality suddenly jumps a level. It just arrives in our mind one day without warning.

The philosopher Richard Rose talked often about ‘persistence’ as a method for ‘awakening’, much like Gurdjieff did. Rose said:

Most people want to be inspired to do something with their lives, when what they really need is just to get moving in some small way in a positive direction. That action will then result in the inspiration to perform increasingly larger and more beneficial actions. You need to keep moving, to keep asking the questions, Who am I? Where did I come from? What happens to me when I die? Keep banging your head against the wall.

The mistake people make is to want to wait for something to happen to them before they begin searching. Make up your mind you’re going to find the Truth regardless of what it takes.  You have to do everything you can yourself. Push your head from the inside, push it to the end of its capacity. Persist. Have faith in the process and in yourself, regardless of whether you go insane, drop dead, or whatever. Persist. Keep the computer going.

Eventually, if you’re lucky, your head explodes. Once a person makes a commitment to the Truth, I mean truly demonstrates a sincere desire to find his Real Self at all cost, then this commitment will attract assistance and protection. Opportunities arise. Blocks are removed. Decisions may even be made for you.

The doors of perception will open at some point….just keep going relentlessly. It’s a commitment combined with action. We create conviction by action. Action precedes conviction.

Persistence is the part we have control over. The other part comes to us when we exhibit persistence, and that is ‘grace’. A person on the path has help. Have no doubt that this will happen, our intuition, ability to receive messages, direction, will just happen, we start to connect with our Higher Self that guides us if we start on the path. And that path will explain the things that help us raise our level of awareness. It’s a long road, but we have to start somewhere.

The Gurdjieff Method for ‘awakening’ required pushing the body physically beyond its limits relentlessly, continually. He was teaching students in France about a century ago, and the well-known literary critic at that time, AR Orage, decided to join the the group of initiates working with Gurdjieff in France, mainly to ‘find out about them’ and possibly to do an exposure of Gurdjieff as a fraud, but ended up discovering a deep truth. Gurdjieff made him work at some manual labour and pushed him continually beyond breaking point. At some point however, rather than collapsing and giving up in disgust, Orage continued to push himself and then he said ‘something changed in him’. He found inner meaning and his spirit. Another initiate, JG Bennett, one of his more notable initiates who also wrote of his experiences, discovered the same thing as AR Orage.

There are many ways to ‘push’ ourselves, whether this be relentless studying of relevant literary works (which is the most common method), doing physical activities (Gurdjieff used physical labour and complex dance routines), meditation exercises, the list is endless, it could be some combination of them, but the key is persistence.

Finally, the nineteenth century spiritualists, such as Frederick Myers and William Stead, knew this method too.

Myers said: 

The traveller who will persevere in the arduous business of increasing the range of his sensitivity and understanding will, stage by stage, find himself growing in perception of ever more extensive ranges of the creative universe.

Similarly, Stead said: 

If you train your mind in the way an athlete trains his body, you can then ask for, and receive great knowledge and much help, spiritual and material. 

And finally, Stead also said (after his death, via his daughter, in a channelled automatic writing session) some of the most important words that can ever be conveyed to us in our physical world:

I urge you to concentrate life in the body on objects that will last after you reach this side, and not on those which cease to profit after death. 

30 July 2026