Quote:I appreciate reading your posts, Crossbow.
What is your definition of conscience? Within and without, can you think of anything masquerading as conscience that can be helpful to be aware of? EDIT: I'm thinking an answer to the last question can be used as a means to create smoke & mirrors, so with that in mind, do you know of a way to recognize anything masquerading as conscience without handing out tips and tricks?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g5j8Jioan1wThe distinction you have indicated is the most critical of all distinctions. And the most tricky.
It is the difference between conscience and emotion.
Emotions are affections, sentiments, moods and feelings; they are reactions as likes and dislikes, wants and not wants, desires for this or that, attractions and repulsions towards things and thoughts of things. They move first as likes and dislikes, become desires, impulses and drives, and effect as sensate feelings on the physical body in the abdomen, chest, throat and hands and elsewhere. There are the feel good emotions and the feel bad emotions, and the energising and energy draining emotions. Emotions are paired and tend to alternate. No one gets to know an emotion without knowing its opposite or the condition that would stir its opposite.
Between conscience and emotion is self and mind, so these two naturally serve as a wedge which we can use to prise apart the other two. We are our self that wedge.
Although conscience is above the self and emotions are below ↨ and all we need to do is know the difference between looking up and looking down, it is not that easy, for the human state is designed to be disorientating and deceptive, with truth veiled and mixed up with falsity in every possible way all around and within our self. Only by learning to see through this puzzle can truth be fully realised, for truth cannot be known without contrast. First up, though, we must believe in truth, especially that truth exists before we know it, for that readies the mind, makes us receptive to truth.
Those who think they know the truth before they do have snookered themselves and don’t even know it, and those who say there is no truth, only individual perception and opinion, prompt others to turn their back on truth so they can have it for themselves, but then they can’t because love is part of truth so truth cannot go into them.
Regarding conscience and reason, emotion, and manipulation To some extent I am happy to hand out tips and tricks. The more the general population knows about deceit, manipulation and delusion, what they are, how they work and how they are used, then all the better, for knowledge of the workings of deceit, manipulation and delusion makes deceivers powerless and helps preserve sanity and genuine goodness. It is a sort of arms race though; deceivers get smarter all the time, but so do those who stand with truth.
The feel-good and feel-right emotions masquerade as conscience. People everywhere fall into this trap. They think that if it feels good and right then it must be good and right, but they are mistaken.
Then there are those who know very well that emotions are false guides, that they weaken the individual and the collective, and make them easily manipulated. They are the true deceivers, haters and manipulators in the world who are mentally centred but deliberately mislead others by enticing them to follow and believe in the rightness of their emotions.
If we would become proficient in our own self-governance, which all men want to be, then we would do well to study our own psychological makeup and learn how it works, so that we can adjust it, service it, and tune it, so that we understand it and better operate it. As with a motorcar, mechanical knowledge makes us more understanding and conscious of the operating functions of our vehicle and we become better drivers.
Remember when we were boys and would take apart an old wind up clock to see how it works. As men we like to know how things work, and as men who are students of truth and of the human condition we should know how our psychological mechanism works. If we don’t then we are overlooking the most important mechanism that we should study. And our ignorance of it will not only cause us to fall into difficulties of our own making but we also become sitting bunnies for manipulators too.
We should study the nature of emotions, what they are and how they work, and learn to distinguish them from rational sensible thought.
Reason is the ability to weigh up known facts. We should exercise and develop it.
Conscience is our highest sense within our self of what is good and right to do. We should exercise and develop it.
Better judgement is reason and conscience combined. We should learn to bring it to bear upon emotion.
We should endeavour to become good mechanics and operators of our psychological vehicle.
When you next gaze over a span of water towards the sun, look at the sun and its reflection in the water. Conscience is reflected in emotion like the sun is reflected in water, upside down, diffused, and not the real item. Emotion entices us to look down at that reflection thinking it is the real sun, but it is not, it is water.
We should remember that just because something feels good and right, does not mean it is.
Some objective definitions of conscienceConscience is the highest sense within our self of what is good and right to do.
Conscience is like a skylight at the inner upper pinnacle of our being.
Conscience is the crown centre.
Conscience is that part of God within our self.
Conscience is the light and voice of God-within.
Some subjective/objective definitions of conscienceConscience is my highest sense within myself of how to treat others and what to do.
Conscience is my conscience.
Conscience is faith.
Faith is the (raw) power of God. Faith is the certainty of God-within. Faith is the power of God in man.
Faith is conscience.
Faith comes in through conscience but the heart is where faith is fulfilled and expressed.
(Faith is not belief. Belief and faith are like oil and water, they do not mix. Belief is an unknown conviction. Faith is the certainty that truth can be known.)
An example of an assertion to help establish alignment with conscience:My conscience is my highest sense within myself of what is good and right to do.
I will obey my conscience.
X 1
Whatever temptations come my way, my conscience is my guide.
Whatever decisions I have to make, my conscience is my guide.
Whatever thoughts I do create, my conscience is my guide.
Whatever words that I do speak, my conscience is my guide.
Whatever actions I do take, my conscience is my guide.
X 10
Repeat several cycles and meditate on the concept.
A repetition that assists in distinguishing self from mind:I am the rightful master of the mind X 3
All thought will have purpose, all thought will be constructive X 1
Repeat several cycles and meditate on the concept.
A warning:Tread lightly, and cautiously. Do not rush. Think carefully ahead. Be highly observant. Pause and assess every sensation as you advance.
Just like rushing in daily life can lead to accidents, so too, rushing our spiritual development can lead to accidents.
There are slips, and trips, and pitfalls, and all sorts of deceptive traps.
It should be a steady and careful walk.
For example:The above recitation on conscience might seem quite harmless at first. But it is not. It is potentially very dangerous.
Imagine if you were to learn it off by heart and recite it every morning and several times each sitting, and meditate upon it, over a period of time.
Energy follows our attention. The conscience is like a little spark, a dull coal. And reciting that affirmation is like breathing on that coal. It gets brighter, and flares into flame, giving out much light.
But what is the fireplace made of?
The fireplace is our personality, our mental and emotional bodies with all their habitual tendencies and inclinations.
Is your personality compatible with your conscience? Of course not. No one's is. In their living, everyone lags behind their conscience to some degree.
Flaring the conscience not only brightens it, it elevates it, increasing the difference between our worst and our best, our darkest and our brightest parts of our self.
All those mental-emotional-behavioural tendencies and inclinations we have that are incompatible with our conscience block its light, cause shadows to be cast down through our mental-emotional-physical bodies. The brighter the light, the darker the shadows.
Contrast is the killer.Conscience is our truest guide and also our most severe punisher.
Conscience uplifts but can also destroy.
Work on the characterWorking on improving our character, continually adjusting and correcting our self, adjusting our thinking, our speaking, our behaviour, our interaction with others, must go hand in hand with occult development. If we do not do that work but continue with potent occult development then we will come to grief.
It is like building a fire too hot for a fireplace. The heat cracks the bricks and the house burns down.
It is like a good pianist on and out of tune piano sounds worse than a bad pianist on an out of tune piano.
Work on the personality/character, keep it up with the brightening and elevating of conscience. Don't build the light and voice of conscience up while leaving it inside, contained within itself, unexpressed, but
live it out in thought and word and deed towards others. If we live it out, if we make our character compatible with it, express it in our dealings with all others, then there will be minimal shadows, minimal discord in our system, and we will advance safely.