[CathBraun]

dear foo,
i hear you. it's even a journey trying to understand ideas of what angels and the higher beings are! before i became a mom, i worked at questbookshop in charlottesville and used to take great delight in seeing new titles. now, many year later, elated to discover in cayce "venture inward" mag archives, this bk review by lady used to know who came in shop!
"steiner’s view of human evolution
seeking spirit vision, by dennis klocek.
people who are attracted to edgar cayce’s work are interested in the answers to big questions: what are the connections among body, soul, and spirit? how can we advance in our individual spiritual development? the teachings of rudolf steiner give a detailed model of the human being evolving through eons of time along with other spiritual beings. they also give many meditations and concentration exercises. what had been missing was an explanation of the workings of the exercises as specifically related to human physiology, physical and subtle … until now.... his new book, seeking spirit vision, is an amalgam of elements of his personal journeying into the fields of art, mythology, alchemy, dowsing, shamanism, and medicine. their interrelationships bring new light to the anthroposophical paradigm of individual development and the evolution of humanity. klocek takes particular pains to show how certain practices can be either beneficial or detrimental, depending on the stage of evolution of the individual.

alternately speaking in the vocabularies of alchemy, anthroposophy, and medical science, klocek presents detailed and vivid pictures of how human consciousness is evolving into a stage of specific, alert, imaginative consciousness.

beyond that stage, a precisely structured but receptively content-free consciousness allows inspirations of higher spiritual beings to enter. as with all budding new growths, these changes in consciousness are very subtle developments, in themselves nonphysical, yet interfacing with the physical body.

particularly engrossing are the chapters relating imagination and inspiration to the brain, endocrine system, and nervous system. consciously undertaken exercises for developing higher spiritual capacities influence the forming and functioning of these physical instruments. klocek weaves together diverse references from steiner into a formulation illuminated by mythological analogies. analogs, in fact, are the keys to expanding one’s repertoire of perception, and klocek uses them masterfully. he describes the interplay of the pineal and pituitary glands with attention to spiritual influences, yielding fascinating insights into the nature of sleeping and dreaming.

as consciousness transforms, so does the dream life. a specific succession of stages of soul transformation is delineated by tracing through the great tree of the alchemical tradition. at the stage of “when asleep, be awake,” a rudimentary continuity of consciousness is maintained from wakeful consciousness to sleeping (dreaming) consciousness. exercises are included, which, like so many exercises, seem simple until you attempt to practice them regularly. this section of the book can be taken as a how-to manual, providing the outline of a progressive meditation practice.

the time has come for us to claim and exercise our spiritual birthright: our freedom to choose to strive for our own advancement. by developing ourselves as spiritual beings, we come to know ourselves as true individuals and also one with the christ. freedom entails possibilities and consequences. klocek does not neglect unpleasant possibilities that are hard to hear. we need to hear and heed them. they are warnings about failure to take the path of most resistance against our own inertia. his book is a plea for us to apply ourselves to develop the exquisite soul capacities that can be ours.
eleanor amidon
the reviewer is an a.r.e. member and anthroposophical society member who attended the 1997-1998 goethean studies program at rudolf steiner college. "

as eleanor wrote: "..allows inspirations of higher beings to enter." was happy to discover eleanor was granted a ph.d and in her thesis she details about the higher spiritual beings steiner speaks of, and their role in human life.

a first taste of this complexity registered in theory when read steiner's "guardian angels: connecting with our spirit guides and helpers".
you could check out matherne's review of title here:
http://www.doyletics.com/arj/guardian.htm
this is an example of something unusual i had never heard of:
"if you've heard a voice in your head tell you urgently to do something such as, 'move!' and then discover you were saved from injury by moving, what you heard may have been a spiritual entity such as an angel communicating through your lower internal organs, not through your head.
[page 7] spirits hardly ever speak through any of the organs in the head. the whole world speaks there; the stars in their motions and so on; they speak through the organs in the head. but spiritual entities do indeed also speak to us, and they do so through the other organs, such as the liver. the stomach speaks to the liver, but so do spirits, and also to the lung. spiritual entities speak to all the organs which we do not use for our ordinary life in the conscious mind."
or, as bobby also elucidates, a reality far more complex....:
"as a physicist by academic training i was taught to envision a world of moving atoms, electrons, ions, etc, existing behind our sensory impressions which generate the perceptions we have of the physical world. steiner points to a reality ultimately more complex than any reductionistic physics theory has ever pointed to — he points to the spiritual realities dancing outside of our plato's cave which cast the shadows we spy on the wall of our cave and from which we formulate our physics theories, up until now.

[page 28] i have made it clear to you on more than one occasion that the fantastic world of moving atoms that physicists dream of is definitely not to be found behind our sensory impressions. no, behind the world we perceive with the senses lies something which is of the spirit. it is present in the world of the senses, though we are not directly aware of it when we have the tapestry before us in ordinary consciousness. in reality the tapestry presented to the senses contains the totality of all the spirits which in my occult science are collectively called the spirits of form. anything which presents itself in space has form, and the colored surface also gives objects form. in everything which we experience in space through the senses live the spirits of form, which in the old testament are called the elohim.

the colored surfaces we perceive, therefore, are rightly called maya or illusions created by the underlying realities which we are not yet able to perceive at this stage of human evolution. what we are able to perceive or experience in our sleepy state is the effects of these realities in the form of imagination, inspiration, and intuition. if and when we wake up, we will experience a spirit-filled world in which we have always existed, but were mostly unconscious of, up until now. "

maybe some of this will help in your studies and goals! steiner was a contemporary of cayce and he is gradually becoming better known. his anthroposophical medicine is much larger in europe. i am awed everyday to discover his insights continue to gain recognition. nina