From lecture 135: MOBILITY IN RELAXATION – SUFFERING THROUGH ATTACHMENT OF THE LIFE FORCE TO NEGATIVE SITUATIONS:

I cannot sufficiently emphasize that my talks are not in the least abstract philosophical discourses but very practical guideposts to your immediate life, my friends. Do not ever overlook this fact.

From lecture 122, SELF-FULFILLMENT THROUGH SELF-REALIZATION AS MAN OR WOMAN:

These lectures are predominantly destined for those of you who follow this path of intensive self-development, and are meant to affect those areas in you which are not accessible unless such a path is taken. Hence, many of my friends feel an inner echo and an understanding of these words which go beyond a mere intellectual and theoretical grasp of the subject. Sometimes this understanding comes only a bit later, when the necessary layers of consciousness become free. However, all those who do the deep inner work on their path can sooner or later make use of these lectures in an entirely different way than those friends who merely listen and read the lectures. This difference is distinct and real, but can be ascertained only when you know both kinds of understanding. When the inner experience of truth is lacking because self-development in its vital form is not practiced, these lectures may appear either as merely interesting or self-evident material, or far-fetched theory. When you allow yourself to be deeply affected inside your being, then hearing the lecture is a helpful experience that enables you to further transcend yourself, to understand your problems in a more profound way. Self-exploration makes forever new layers of your psyche accessible to your awareness. The lectures are directly aimed at these layers as they come up.

From lecture 131: INTERACTION BETWEEN EXPRESSION AND IMPRESSION:

People have too ingrained a tendency to obey an authority. We have discussed this amply in the past, but never quite in this connection. In a very subtle, and still vastly undetected way, you pursue even such a liberating activity as the pathwork — whose aim is to attain full selfhood in every possible way — without making use of the material according to the momentary needs of your psyche. You try to use the material as if it contained rules to be governed by. This, of course, has a stifling effect. Even though such an approach cannot kill the vital stream within yourself, it does not encourage its manifestation.

The lectures — all the material and help given to you on this path — only serve as you freely take one aspect at a time of the teachings, appropriate for you at a particular moment. In other words, my friends, there is a tremendous difference between trying to use these words at the moment — following through and listening into yourself, freely allowing for what may come up — and recognizing that the evolving material fits into this or that lecture or statement of the teachings. This is a very opposite approach. Too often, in a subtle and unrecognized way, you try to find and squeeze yourself into the tools given you, rather than locate your inner material first and choose the tool afterward. The latter approach will make you free, while the former continues to bind you. Only the authority has changed, not you and your attitudes. This becomes even more confusing because everything you learn and hear points to liberation and selfhood and self-responsibility. Therefore it is easy to overlook the subtle bondage of squeezing your soul movements into patterns and stages of this work rather than letting them out and then seeing the stages into which they fit. In order to do that, you have to have the courage to ask: “Am I now more in need of emptying out because heaviness and depression indicate that I ignore what really bothers me, or do I need to instruct myself?”

From lecture 214, PSYCHIC NUCLEAR POINTS:

This lecture primarily addresses the creative process in the universe. I do not, however, give lectures for the purpose of handing out information about generalities, no matter how lofty the spiritual truths may be. These lectures must always be directly connected with something that you can use here and now. There is no metaphysical truth that cannot find immediate application to your life regardless of your present state of development. This lecture will begin by dealing with general concepts. You will then see how you can make use of them in a very personal way.

From lecture 252, PRIVACY AND SECRECY:

The particular sequence of lectures may appear, off hand, arbitrary and not necessarily connected, but upon more profound reflection you will see that there is a meaningful sequence and a connection between the topics. In fact, one could not be properly assimilated without the other. All of them form a comprehensive whole. A study in meditation will reveal how all these topics are intricately connected. Every single one of the topics, and all of them together, will open new channels of consciousness in you which, in turn, will make you capable of living the new life that is starting to evolve on your earth sphere.

From lecture 248, THREE PRINCIPLES OF THE FORCES OF EVIL — PERSONIFICATION OF EVIL:

When you look at this series of lectures from some distance, you will clearly perceive that there is a profound meaning in their specific sequence. Retrospectively you can recognize this rhythm and meaning in the sequence of lectures. The topic of each lecture and its sequence spell out an articulate message the spirit world is sending to you to help you take the further necessary steps on your path.

From lecture 25, THE PATH: INITIAL STEPS, PREPARATION, AND DECISIONS:

Moreover, I want to tell you before I begin that many of the words I shall give you in these particular lectures can be treated as a meditation. You should retain these words and not just read them once, for that will not be enough. You should meditate on these teachings, so that this knowledge may eventually grow from being superficial and intellectual to reaching the deeper regions of your being. Only then will they be really beneficial to you.

From lecture 162, THREE LEVELS OF REALITY FOR INNER GUIDANCE:

Jesus Christ has proclaimed that the Kingdom of Heaven is within. These words are only too often taken for granted and not much thought is given them. What does the word “kingdom” mean? It symbolizes the absolute power and wealth which the spiritually awakened find to be a reality. We speak, of course, of the spiritual power and wealth of love, truth, peace, expansion, creativity, bliss, and the knowledge that the self has the power to create anything it can conceive of. This comprises everything that life could ever be. It means attaining one’s full selfhood as it is meant to be. If only you would realize that you have not even attained a particle of the power and beauty, truth and love, ecstasy and possibility of creative expansion which you could posses and manifest and which already is yours, my friends! These are not empty words, this is the immediately available truth.

The path toward the inner reality and inner guidance is laborious only because you imagine the truth to be so far away, much farther than it actually is. You cannot conceive of what life already is, right now, and how it could be for you if only you could see it, know it, and therefore realize it. You still perceive this as a faraway, abstract, unreal theory, and you experience yourself as an isolated particle in an essentially hostile or, at best, indifferent universe that has nothing to do with you. You conceive of a static and immovable universe into which you are put and whose laws have no relationship to your own inner laws.

This concept, and the way you therefore experience yourself in relation to life, is what makes the path so difficult and laborious — nothing else. Thus, the difficulty is not actual. The question is how you can change your concept. This is what requires labor and effort. And, unbelievable as this appears to one who has already attained the reality of being, you struggle against the fulfillment of being your true self as if it were the most horrible fate in the world. If the illusion about the separation between your true being and your momentary consciousness, or the separation between the universe and yourself, did not exist, there would be an instant awakening — a “click,” as it were — and you would know who you are and what life is.

All my lectures, all our work together, attack the problem of your illusion from different angles. These various approaches have a certain sequential order. Generally, you find that your own private personal path follows the same order. Yet you cannot force your individual path to imitate the sequence of the lectures. Rather, the process is — as some of you have already found out — that with this guiding help you find your own truth as a direct, spontaneous experience from within. In the first moments of understanding, the truth usually appears so new and fresh that you think you have never heard it before. But afterward you can verify that it confirms the teachings you have studied and which have penetrated the deeper regions of your unconscious. You study the lectures and then you use your own intuitive faculties, freed more and more by facing the truth you did not want to see in the beginning. Elimination of error frees intuition and creative experience from within. The lectures first give an impetus to this process and later fortify and confirm it when you read them again.

From lecture 57, THE MASS IMAGE OF SELF-IMPORTANCE:

Before we turn to your questions, I would like to say a few words to some friends who have never found their way here and who have never had any personal contact with this group, but who read the lectures with interest. Attention has been brought to us that some of them try, on their own, to reach the depth of their souls by themselves, or with some friends. Their good intent is appreciated. But I should like to tell them that it is not really possible to succeed by oneself, or even with someone else who has not had personal experience in this particular method. The method of the work itself cannot be conveyed by the lectures. The lectures serve as general material, but they cannot give the method itself. You will do no harm in working by yourself, but you will not really get very far. I would therefore suggest to those friends, do not hesitate to get in touch with those members of this group who are qualified to help. If they are really interested in using this method, whether for others or for themselves, this will be necessary.