All humans suffer and
it doesn't matter who you are or what you own, how much money you do
or don't have, suffering is something that all humans have to face.
Yes, it might seem like some suffer more than others, and they
probably do in many ways. But we also have to remember that
everyone's experiences are different. Because of how society is set
up it creates obsessive wants in people, that never seem to be
fulfilled. So whereas a poor person is suffering because they can't
get enough food or even decent clothes to wear, and they never seem
to have enough to pay their rent at the end of the month... those who
do have a lot of money buy massive houses and expensive cars, and
expensive clothes and jewellery and they too often end up in major
debt because they cannot control their need for more. So it seems
that no matter what someone has, it is never enough... Unless of
course, you learn the reasons for this behaviour and in turn how to
control it.
I am sure you have all
heard about the 7 deadly sins. What many don't know is that 7 sins
are countered each with a heavenly virtue, and that these 7 things
are connected to the chakra system in our bodies which are the
endocrine glands. When any of these chakras are out of balance, this
leads to problems with the endocrine gland that it governs, they also
manifest in several ways in our lives and causes severe disruptions
if we don't learn how to balance them.
The Seven Virtues &
Their Corresponding Sins, Chakra & Endocrine Gland
|
Virtue
|
Sin
|
Chakra
|
Endocrine
Gland
|
|
Chastity
|
Lust
|
Root
|
Testes/Ovaries
|
|
Temperance
|
Gluttony
|
Sacral
|
Pancreas
|
|
Patience
|
Wrath
|
Solar
Plexus
|
Adrenal
|
|
Kindness
|
Envy
|
Heart
|
Thymus
|
|
Diligence
|
Sloth
|
Throat
|
Thyroid
|
|
Charity
|
Greed
|
Third
Eye
|
Pituitary
|
|
Humility
|
Pride
|
Crown
|
Pineal
|
You might think all you
have to do is not do any of the sins and just do the virtue and you
will be happy. But that isn't the case, balance is the key to
everything. What we need to do is realise those 7 sins are within us,
admit them, own them and then learn how to balance them with the
virtues. Only then can we be free of suffering.
So you might ask why is
this so hard to do?
Because it is very
difficult for someone to admit to these not so pleasant aspects of
themselves, we all like to think we are good people and I am sure you
are, sometimes, but we all do and think things that are far from
virtuous, and if you cannot admit this to yourself you will never
eliminate the suffering they cause you. I will give you a few
examples for each one as a guide.
Chastity and Lust –
in a world where we are increasingly told it is fine to have sex with
anyone and everyone this one can be a very hard one to conquer.
Finally, you think humanity has shed the need to demonise people who
just want to have sex without any feelings involved.
Did you know that every
time you have meaningless sex with someone you don't love, you become
dumber and less aware? It makes it harder to complete the Great Work,
another reason why men find it harder than women.
When Aleister Crowley
talked about sacrificing a young boy, he was talking about when he
climaxes, he has made a sacrifice.
“For the highest
spiritual working one must accordingly choose that victim which
contains the greatest and purest force. A male child of perfect
innocence and high intelligence is the most satisfactory and suitable
victim.”
Using this method to
gain magickal powers, is a sacrifice, as you lose out somewhere else
later. This is also true when you use masturbation to charge a sigil.
Unless you have already reached Kether, and therefore you can use
your energy to help others.
Making this sacrifice
will make things harder to complete the work. Most people just do
what is right for them NOW, and don't care about the consequences
later, that is why New Age religions go on and on about living in the
now, they never want you to reach your full potential. Of course it
is wise to not worry about the past or the future, too much. However,
if you don't 'act' now for the sake of your future, nothing ever
changes, including your level of spiritual attainment.
When you practise
tantra you learn to never climax, and instead to loop the energy back
round your system, so that it shoots back up your spine and down
again in a cycle, in the figure of 8, the centre of the 8 is at your
heart chakra, which is why performing tantra is about love and
respect of yourself and your partner. This is one way to have sex
without draining away your energy. The ecstasy can then last as long
as you like as you loop the energy round. When you end the session,
rather than climaxing you send the energy to your Crown, making it a
win-win situation.
The best thing to do is
never waste your energy, if you must release energy, use it to charge
a sigil at the same time. Then at least it is going towards something
good. If someone focuses on something negative as they release, like
porn or some perversion, then that is what the energy is going
towards. If you masturbate thinking about a celebrity, for instance,
your energy is going towards them. This is why sexy celebrities
become so powerful. But if the energy is negative, then it can affect
them badly too. For instance porn stars who are used purely for sex
and not respected in any way, even though they have lots of money, end up hooked on drugs and feeling worthless, then die young.
Sending out bad energy
to others, hurts you as much as your victim though. Others sending
you bad energy does affect your life, people in the public eye risk
a lot by being there.... hence, they have sold their soul to the
Devil, the Devil here represents the dark side which is inside all of
us, we can use our energy for good or bad. Using it for bad harms us,
using it for good is a sacrifice, using it within ourselves helps us
in the Great Work.
Temperance &
Gluttony – This one is about having restraint and control over our
need for overindulgence. When there is plenty of food, drink, drugs
and all kinds available to us, it can be very tempting to abuse
these things, none of which is good for us. At the same time to deny
ourselves some pleasure is also not doing us any favours. You
could compare it to treating yourself to a special home-cooked meal
with fresh organic ingredients or stuffing your face with junk food
from the local takeaway. From enjoying a nice drop of whisky in an
evening, or a glass of wine with dinner, to binge drinking every
weekend or becoming an alcoholic. It can also be related to gambling
and other things that can become addictive if we overindulge. This
one reminds us that nothing is actually a sin when it is in
moderation.
Patience & Wrath –
You only have to spend a little time online or looking a YouTube
clips to find out how angry people seem to be these days. It is like
most of them are waiting for someone to do something they can feel
annoyed about or offended by then they can get out all their hate and
anger on whoever it was that triggered the explosion. People who get
angry and have aggressive outbursts often say they can't control this
and that it isn't healthy to bottle it all up inside. However, having
outbursts is NOT good for you, and it actually gives the person such
an adrenaline rush that they start to get addicted to the feeling and
that leads to even more nasty behaviour. Soon they are pushing away
their friends, family and partner because they can no longer put up
with their outbursts that can become violent.. walls are punched,
things are broken and if this behaviour continues it could lead to them
and others being seriously hurt, or worse still it can lead to
murder.
When something is
troubling you, you need to face it right away and ask yourself why it
is troubling you, and learn to stop letting your emotions and worries
about one thing be taken out on others. By no means I am saying to
never let your hurt feelings out, but to talk about them calmly and
resolve the issue is much better than letting problems stew inside
you until one unfortunate person happens to get in your way and you
take it all out on them. To be at peace you have to learn how to
control this addiction to the adrenaline you feel when getting angry,
because the consequences of your actions are not good.
Kindness & Envy –
Humans are not the only animals who struggle with feelings of envy
towards others around them, and it can be very self-destructive and
lead to unpleasant behaviour. To see everyone around you as
competition leads you to feel like you aren't good enough. Your
neighbour got a new car, well then you must go out and get an even
better one. Envy will actually lead you to have a voice in your head
telling you that the only reason your neighbour got a new car was to
show off and make you feel inadequate. You never stop to think that
maybe the old car they had wasn't so reliable any more and they just
wanted something better. YOU never even crossed their mind when they
were choosing their new vehicle. Envy is strongly linked to
narcissism because the envious soul truly believes people are only
being better than them at something to hurt them. It can lead to
becoming resentful and nasty to others. Opening your heart to
kindness is the only way to overcome this. Being genuinely happy for
other people's achievements and not allowing yourself to feel any
envy can be difficult to conquer, but when you do and give up the
need to have everything that everyone else has it is very freeing. So
long as you have what you need, why be envious of anyone else? And
even if you don't yet have what you need, being happy for others who
already do have things is much more likely to lead you to
achieve your own goals than envy ever will. With a clear mind and
no need to impress others, you can get your priories straight, not get
yourself in debt trying to keep up with others and make a better
future for yourself. No one ever got themselves out of a bad
situation by worrying about what everyone else is up to, if they focus on
their own goals and targets, and be happy for others who have reached
theirs, gratitude can lead to happiness.
Diligence & Sloth –
If you spend your time doing nothing because you are too lazy to do
anything to better your circumstances then you only have yourself to
blame. Diligence is about work ethic but it can be as mundane as
looking after your personal hygiene, even if you are alone, for your
own well being. Giving in to the feeling of laziness is fine if you
want few days break, but when you make a habit of doing nothing at
all by wasting all your time, don't complain when you find you have
become depressed. You should never think you are bored, there are
simply too many things to do and experience in life for that. How
many books are there to read? You once said you want to write a book, didn't you? How can you say you are bored and have nothing to do when
you could be writing a book? You could be doing some art, making
something, the possibilities are endless. Sloth is the reason so many
who find themselves out of work, have such difficulty getting back
into it. Doing nothing is easier than making the effort to achieve
something each day. And when sloth becomes a habit, it is very hard
to break. Give yourself a break every now and then, but give up on
everything and allow yourself to be lazy for too long and it will
ruin your life.
Charity & Greed –
Have you ever wondered why so many people give to charity? It is
usually to stop themselves feeling so guilty about their greed.
Humans who have too much of something can't help but feel guilty
about that, and for some it can be very small amounts of something.
Inside the rich successful person will feel a bit like a fraud
because they don't really understand why they have so much when
others have nothing. They know it doesn't make sense that some people
work so hard in manual labour jobs and get next to nothing, and yet
they get to live a life of luxury. And although they might not admit
this publicly, they will have thought about it a lot. Everyone, no
matter who, has insecurities and self-doubts and giving to others can
help heal the insecurities they feel about themselves inside. The
voice inside of them is saying: “I can't be a bad person, how can I
be when I just gave all this money to charity. Now I can enjoy my
luxury life for a while more before the guilt comes back again”.
Even the poorest people will feel this guilt about something, because
no matter how little you have there will always be someone else who
has less.
Humility & Pride –
When the ego isn't in check it can lead to arrogant behaviour and the
belief that one is better than everyone else. We see this a lot in
those who set themselves up as gurus, spiritual teachers and life
coaches. How arrogant do you think someone has to be to call
themselves a guru to other people? How arrogant are they to believe
they can give you advice on how to run your own life? Often with no
official education, these pseudo-shrinks really do think they are the
bee's knees. They would do well to have some humility and realise
that they don't know everything and they can only ever be responsible
for their own path, no one else's. They actually believe they are
themselves illuminated and yet don't even realise that simple truth.
Instead of trying to teach others things they themselves don't even
know, they would do well to look inside and deal with their own
daemons. Naive enlightenment tricks many and few escape it.
This was just a brief
summary of how the 7 virtues and 7 deadly sins can affect our lives.
Don't be fooled into thinking it has anything at all to do with
religion, it is all about our own inside work and psychology. Looking
into these 7 things can help you on your journey, it can help you
face the things you are afraid to face about yourself.
Try to be brave, don't
be worried about what you will discover when you look at your dark
side, you cannot overcome things you are not willing to admit to.