Decision to work

 

Decision To Work / Document 3

April 2000

 

PART ONE

 

Alan : Tamara!

Tamara : Ken (Yes)

Alan : I thought maybe you went down to the computer. When I looked up, the balance in this room, whatever it was made of, felt like it collapsed when you walked out. It could have happened had anybody left, I don't know, but the balance was affected . . . much better now.

Maybe it's connected with what I want to say. That's a funny expression. When a person says: 'what I want to say' – they don't really know what they are going to say. They know they want to say something, they have a 'feeling', but they don't have the words. That's one of the reasons why learning is a slow process. If we saw the truth all at once, we would go crazy. For example, when you say 'I want to say', you really don't know what it is you are going to say. Then how does it work? How do you say it if you don't know (laugh)?

People end off 'saying'. They do a lot of saying. The funny part of it is that they do a lot of talking, of saying, and they never really get to say what they want to say. People walking about with cellular telephones, talking to their mother six times a day and their girlfriend twelve times a day. You know, they're talking, talking. They're trying to say something. But no one is catching it, so they have to continue. They don't even ask themselves: 'What is it that I'm trying to say, why am I talking?'

Now, I'm going to try to tell you what I wanted to say. That's a problem. "Everything in the world is connected, so there's no such thing as a small thing." That almost sounds scary. But in this intense period of history it should be obvious. I don't think it becomes obvious to people because for something to become obvious, you have to be paying attention! Things happen and change – without it being obvious – because you didn't notice what was before and you don't notice what was after. You, maybe, just feel an increased awkwardness or an increase of pressure, or whatever. You feel the change, but you don't know what it was.

There are a lot of things far more obvious these days because of the accelerated speed of things. People live within the change but they haven't really seen it yet. Sometimes they see a little, but then they do not really acknowledge it. For instance, the big one is: No one knows what they're talking about.

All you have to do is pay a little attention. You inevitably notice that when every once in a while someone says: "Oh, you lied – you just said 'that' and now you're saying the opposite!"

You see, this is not really what I wanted to talk about. Last night is also a good example. I started talking about Giora, just because of the few things that Hillel said. It lit up his file in my studio. Something became very clear, or on the edge of it, and I started to talk. I mean, Jesus! I didn't have the energy for that. I don't know if I had or not – it seems I did, because I did it. It had everything in the god-damn world in it, the relationship with this person and everything around.

I'll try to come closer to the point. A few things that were written down:

"The word 'flexibility' will take on an increasingly deeper significance as life continues to come at us (or 'in the future')."

What is the 'future'? We're changing and everything else is changing. We're getting older, each person is getting older. It's not only that when you were nineteen you had a completely different relationship to the world than you had when you were sixteen. It doesn't stop. With each new experience, you're changing.

So, we're 'moving on'. We're moving into life, and life, of course, is also moving. Everything is moving. That's where the illusion of 'time' comes in, but that's a subject in itself. I've said it more than once: 'I do what I do when I do it and leave the results to the universe.' Everyone says: 'oh yeah, sure.' But what is that? You 'do' and the whole of the everything else 'does'!

You read in the Work, that: "Man lives in the illusion that he can do." Everyone says 'yeah', but they can only see up to their own level of experiencing. You can observe how, when you want to do something, and then you go to do it, but you don't do it. Or, you decide something the night before, and you get up in the morning and even the thought of it is gone. Or, you say you'll never do something again and the next time you bump into a similar situation, you do the exact same thing. So you begin to see the gap between your intentions and your action. This is, maybe, the most obvious level of 'man cannot do'.

Again, in the Work it is said: "All real doing is indirect."

At the mechanical level, 'it' does. You can, more or less, understand that. But Work Ideas have a density of meaning – even if they also stand-up simply as common sense.

A general goes out and decides he's going to 'win the war'. What's he going to do? He's got a couple of hundred-thousand soldiers. Who is going to do what? Who is going to do when? Then there are a couple hundred-thousand soldiers on the other side. Nobody knows. The general 'won the war'. Maybe you don't need that kind of example. The obvious thing is: you go out to do something, say, to meet somebody and they're either there or they're not. Maybe they've got stomach cramps, or they're stoned, or their astrology is 'off'. What do you control when you say: 'I will do?' What do you affect? You go to visit your family – you do what you do and they continue doing what they're doing. And it's not just what they're trying to do, it's mostly how they're being affected. They are doing the only thing they can do!

So called 'doing' is getting ever more frantic as the days go by. And that leads us back to the word 'flexibility'.

Intelligence is defined in the Work as Flexibility. If anyone hasn't registered that, then they haven't read enough, or they read and didn't take it seriously. If you didn't know where it was coming from, you would say: 'Ah, that's an interesting thought'. But if you know where it's coming from, you say: 'Ah, you know – 'Flexibility' – that sounds BASIC!'

Rachel said something last night. She said that everybody is like, how did she put it: 'Waiting for something to happen?' I think that's the way she put it. You know, like Raffa is waiting to go to Spain. She gave a few other examples, three or four. People 'just about' to do something. Hagit, Nathalie and Juliet, I didn't hear details, but the contract on their house is coming to an end. They are in the gap between what they've got and what they might have. It's obvious. Na'ama, she's facing . . . the two Na'ama's are faced-off against each other. The essential and the conditioned one. They are having a very serious encounter, because they are both strong like hell. The superficial one has been using the energy of the real one for a long time. Very strong she now has to BE. She's a good example, because she's so, kind of, expressive. I'm not so sure it's very different with Aviv – but she's not so expressive.

Certain things seem so obvious that you don't get to think about them. Anyone who ever heard the word 'flexibility' maybe got the feeling that they understood what that was. A word is used, and everyone knows exactly what it means, right? "Well I know that word, flexibility, flexibility!"

"Every Work Idea is like a seed, with a density of meaning."

This is a Work Idea: Intelligence equated to flexibility. There's a density of meaning there. And I think that anyone who is a little bit sensitive, but never thought of the word – is just gonna find out what that really means. If you thought about it or not – here she comes baby!

A few things came up recently that I had to talk myself into believing might be useful, to talk about. Like last night, talking about Giora. Now I'm talking about 'man doing, not doing' and 'flexibility'. It feels completely inadequate because it's just putting a few words to such big issues. Real understanding doesn't come by being intellectually 'smart', by being able to put this word with that word and coming up with a nice sentence, a nice explanation.

You rub fifty words together, that represent fifty experiences, and you expect an  answer. You might actually need five hundred pieces of experience to see the issue clearly. You have to have more pieces – like in a jigsaw puzzle. It's not 'figuring it out' intellectually – it's seeing it.

So I talked about Giora last night, but it was really humanity I was speaking about, yeah. Now I let myself speculate about what we're actually doing? I see something that you may have a few pieces of. You're rubbing five pieces together, maybe you don't even know you're rubbing them, and I'm saying that's a very serious thing you're doing there. So, I manage to give you some more pieces. Now, you're not rubbing five pieces, you're rubbing fifty pieces and all of a sudden the subject begins to open up. You begin to see. But it's still only fifty-odd pieces. For me to talk about fifty pieces, in a way, I have to see five hundred. I can point out fifty from the five hundred. I can see the five that you're rubbing and add fifty more. It's awkward to explain, but you're going to have to see many more pieces – if you care to know what's really going on.

What does it mean: 'what's really going on'? What you are, and what other people are, and what the world is. That's what's 'going on'!

What can a man 'do'? He doesn't control what's going on inside himself, and certainly not what's going on around him. You do what you do, and the universe does the rest, no? Obviously. Well, maybe you don't even have five pieces yet in that 'poker game'.

 

There is a new set of cards in work, which I keep talking about with such enthusiasm. There are over two hundred pieces to choose from. I went through them quickly for the ones I thought might be best and picked out one hundred. Now I want to select fifty, for the final set. These cards are not like the ones that had poems. Those poems were loaded – anyone with some background could spend a good week just meditating on each card. They're mathematical. But most of them have, on average, ten lines. The new set of cards will be shorter. Someone recently made a deck of cards with only a picture and one word! They understand something. You give a person more than one word and they get confused. Keep it simple.

Example:

"Conscience is conflict free."

Four words, lovely. Who ever thought of the word 'conscience' and the difference between that and 'morality'?

Now this next one is beautiful. It came out of the book 'End of Days Diary' by the Alperons:

"Love is the pulse that happens as feedback between call and response."

'Love is the pulse . . .' Pulse, everyone knows what pulse is? 'Love is the pulse that happens as feedback between call and response'. Doesn't that taste like something very pure?

Another card says:

"Love is not an embarrassment, it's a state."

Two definitions for love? One definition is too much. Okay.

Can you picture someone picking a card like this?:

"No matter how it goes, it's no skin off my nose."

You need someone who understands that expression in English. I guess that card would have to be labeled 'Freedom'. What else could freedom be? Basically, freedom is 'freedom from fear'. Freedom means you can do what you want, right? So what stops you from doing what you want? Why doesn't everyone do what they want? They're afraid, no? You don't do what you want because you're afraid of what the consequences might be.

It leaves open a big question. So you say: 'Okay, so I'm not afraid of anything, I'll just do what I want.' Well, it's not exactly the complete story. You have to figure out what the hell it is you want. Because everything in you 'wants'. You want 'this' one minute and 'that' the next. Freedom is not license. License is: you do whatever you want. Here we assume a serious individual.

If freedom is freedom from fear, then you have to be absolutely and totally neutral as to results. Because, if you're not, and you want 'this' instead of 'that' – then you're in fear. You want 'this' but maybe you'll get 'that'. So, neutral – as far as the results are concerned.

There are different angles. First of all, when there is fear there's not this thing called 'love'. Love is a state and fear is a state and you can't be in both at the same time. When you're 'in' love, you have a wider perspective. Love is a level 'above', a level within. It over-sees all else. There you have flexibility and can really see because you're not looking for something you 'want'- you already have it.

So we have to be aware without the 'want' and the 'not want', in order to really see, and that means not to be so focused on what the result will be. When you're not compulsive, relative to the result, then no matter what happens – it's 'no skin off your nose'.

That's how the expression works. The result doesn't affect 'you'. What does affect you is how much you see, how much you understand, how much you are present. If things end off this way, or that way, it's all on the horizontal level. It doesn't change anything essential. If you can remember yourself, if you see more, then you're working the 'vertical line of the cross'. That can make a difference.

"You've got to be careful not to do less than you know best."

You see, I'm still talking about the new cards.

Another one says:

"There's a lot to know, there's a lot to grow."

I love this one. This one is worth . . . this one is gold:

"Pain is a dirty word for high energy begging for attention."

And the last one that came out in Kadita was:

"Before you can see it, you have to be it."

Do we call that card 'Truth'?

So, here we have a Truth card, a Freedom card, a Pain card and two Love cards.

I have to watch myself, I keep on slipping into this other side – my commercial background. One should be very careful of those things.

Could this be a card called 'I'?:

"I don't like to bring myself into it this way,

but it's an illustration of what I want to say."

That's a delicate one. I was going to say 'awkward', but what isn't awkward in this world? How to stimulate thought in a person, or some reflection – without stimulating, say, 'admiration'. It's very tricky. People tend to avoid themselves, by admiring something outside themselves. Then they believe they're important, somehow. They develop an 'identity' which is nonexistent. It's like, I guess, certain people admire Bill Clinton. All this focus on the outside.

"So what, you shouldn't admire people?" People are different, some are better than others at certain things, so we admire them. So, okay, to find another word – not 'admire'. You can 'respect' – okay, you can respect.

But why all this busyness outside? This is what I'm saying, why? It's obvious – that's how the whole world works. They respect Churchill and they disrespect Hitler.

It's all busy on the outside. If something interesting is happening on the outside, it should stimulate your own intelligence, your own seeing. You don't have to 'respect' anything – it's enough to see. You don't have to give a name to it. Admire, respect – maybe it's all too much. Why do we need more words than 'see'?

"Conscience is conflict free." So, if you're in conflict about something, there's one thing you can be sure of – you're not 'in' conscience. That could be a very shocking realization for a serious person. Because if you're not in conscience – then what exactly is motivating you?

Another card:

"Truth says – love me or leave me."

It's not enough to want the truth. If you just want the truth and you come across a truth that is not complementary, you 'don't want it anymore'. It's not enough to want the truth – you've got to love the truth. That indicates a person who has a taste for the 'is' of things.

Someone who wants to know how things 'are', first of all, before they want to change anything, or want to get something more, for themselves. Do you know what kind of intelligence that would take? Before I get 'busy' I want to know what it 'is' I'm getting busy with. Every experience tells me more and shows me more about what is. Whether it's the 'is' of my sexual god-knows what, or the 'is' of my parents, or the 'is' of my . . . any 'is'. I get to see more about what is. At least what 'is' occasionally, it doesn't mean that it is all the time.

Now, no one would necessarily recommend their particular experience of an 'is' to anyone else. There are all kinds of 'is's. There are 'is's that have more in them than other 'is's! You don't have to be a philosopher, you don't have to be a genius. You see many things about other people and you see yourself in different circumstances. You're not the first one who has been in circumstances similar to yours.

If you don't love the Truth then you're in the wrong business !

The main point is: this incredible notion, that when we know a word, we know what it means. Words only point to a reality of some kind. This came up around this word 'flexibility'. Understanding comes with experience – the word or explanation is, at best, a convenience.

We're living in the middle of a word-culture. Everyone is trying to explain things that they've never, for the most part, experienced. Gurdjieff used to say: 'Man has become a second-hand person.' Doesn't have anything of his own – second-hand. The things that he's projecting and saying, he got from someone else, not from his own experience.

So, the word 'flexibility'. When you are truly flexible, then you'll understand what that is. It is not such a simple thing. How do you become flexible? If you love the Truth – you'll find out.

'Flexible' is what is wanted in the steel beams used for construction. There's an earthquake – they bend with it. An earthquake is 'truth'. All of a sudden the 'earth' starts shaking – if you're flexible, you move with it.

How to get back to Being, to the Real Light within ourselves? Our essential identity is in the light, which is the 'seeing', and not in the pictures that are reflected on the inner movie-screen. How to know the difference between 'being' and imagination, to be awake, to remember ourselves and be observant? How can we become full human beings?

If you understand that these are real questions, then you are open to see things that might help in that regard. Then you're open to 'response' – you've got the 'call'. The response is conditioned by the call. The response cannot be bigger than the call. Call a little bit – the response is a little bit. Life is like that.

"Love is the pulse that happens as feedback between call and response".

That's another way of saying that love is communication. Love is intelligent communication. It's an exchange, it's alive, it's feeding. The call is asking for something needed; the response, if it's appropriate, fills the need – which is lovely.

Now, to this issue of 'need and want'. It's like the difference between 'freedom and license'. We have to develop the freedom to act in accordance with what we need. Freedom must be relative to essential need. 'License' is relative to want, whatever one wants: 'I want ice cream, I want, want, want.' The heart wants this, the body wants that, the mind wants this and two minutes later it wants the opposite.

So, 'I do what I want' is a good formula for madness. Or a possible formula for enlightenment as well, because you could see a lot. Maybe it's not so much the difference between need and want, but has more to do with 'identification'. There's a lot to see, and much is painful, a stretch.

I've said it so many times, that I now ask myself if it's true: 'The real difference between madness and enlightenment is a question of identification'. You get stolen if you're identified – it's madness. They don't always lock you up; after all they can't lock up the whole world!

If you are capable of 'separation', then you see what you see and what you don't see, you don't see; you understand what you understand and what you don't understand you don't understand. Whether you understand or not, you still 'are' – and that's the essential thing. There's the 'that' and there's the 'you' Patience. It's very scientific, it's the ultimate.

What are we actually doing here? If the call is true there might be a true response. Then both the call and the response are connected with something Higher. Truth becomes the 'neutralizing force', the intention, the context. Then, in some way, we're open to the whole truth of the universe. It doesn't mean we can eat it all in one swallow. It becomes a dynamic. It's not getting or not getting – that's not the issue. Truth is the issue.

This is a rough kind of explanation of what can take place. Without the call nothing, without the response nothing. And without the truth – nothing of any value.

There's no 'good' without 'bad'. Good and bad are, in a way, positive and negative energies. Personality is all that we acquired since we were born – all the habits of thinking and doing, all the information. That's what personality is, right? We were born in essence. Personality is the black (–) and essence is the white (+). The theologians get very deeply philosophical about this issue – you know, for there to be such a thing as good, there must be such a thing as evil.

So there is the 'Terror of The Situation' – the self-inflicted agonies, twists and turns, the suffering and sickness, the wars and the misunderstandings – the agony! You'll see more and more of it. It's a level of reality which is most important to see. But can you really see it without getting swallowed by it?

The Work has many approaches to this. You can't just stand there and say 'Ah, I'll do it, yeah.' To see truth there are certain things that help, and certain things you just can't do, because they put you to sleep.

The Work can best be referred to as 'Learning how to Learn'. How to get yourself into a clear space where you can 'see'. It's not telling that you should do 'this', and never do 'that'. Work says something very simple:

"You can do anything you want, so long as you Remember-Yourself."

 

Your (Juliet) intelligence and your courage have to come up to the level of your love – your wish for good, your wish for truth, your wish for peace. How to get out of this feeling of being just another 'little girl', another little delicate something? Be delicate – a laser beam is also delicate, but it's clear and strong and to the point.

You (Hagit) call, I respond. You can see what energy it takes. That's fine. But no matter what I'm doing, when I'm talking here, or writing something, I'm obliged to be sensitive to the issue of waste. Especially in regard to another serious person. You can't continue to waste, should you know you waste. Oh, nothing is really wasted, I suppose: good will is registered, some place. But for best results, if something in this exchange has meaning, then – how to evaluate it and how to use it. If there's a call and a response, and the response isn't utilized, then the dynamic has a way of petering-out, of dying.

Just to be able to listen to this, without any fear and without guilt – just to listen to it, as fact. If you're doing something real, you are also learning how things work. If you know 'how things work', then you know that for yourself, and you know it for others as well. That's important – it's not just for you. You can't afford to take it too personally. How can we take a fact, as a fact, without taking it too personally?

Here is an image that comes to mind. A child from a rich family. He's not a child anymore, but as a 'man' he keeps going to his family to borrow money. 'I want to start this business', he claims. And they say: 'You want to start a business? That's good, it's good – we'll give you the money.' And he takes the money – then goes and gambles it away. A year later he comes back and says he wants more money, he's got another 'good idea' – and they give him some more money. But again he doesn't use it as he should. He called, got a response – but then he misuses it. So eventually the family sees that it doesn't work. Just as a fact.

Simple, simple analogy – common sense. Useful to cognize this without saying: 'oh my god – me? What am I, and am I not, doing?' Get into a whole lot of worry – that's stupid. It's better to know the facts, even if you're doing as much as you think you can. Know the difference between what works and what doesn't work – whether your activity is of any real use.

I tell you, if you want something real, you have to be very careful – because you're going to have to give it back. It works that way – life is 'exchange'. If you get anything useful, you're going to have to use it properly. So, good to pay attention to how things work or don't work; to be aware of the difficulties, the human difficulties, in using something properly. It's not so simple – there's so much habit.

Now, you can't say you haven't been told !

 

I can see what the advantage might be if we had a camera on now. I wish I had it, because of the three faces that are now in front of me – they are so beautiful. Each of you should get a good sense of yourself at this moment – that's who you really are, you're strong. And I bet you are more of a lady than anyone in your family.

Anyway, don't compare yourself. You don't have to go through their pretense, their 'good' or 'bad' – it's a waste of time. There are six billion people on the face of the earth – don't waste the whole of your life comparing yourself to a handful of people in Tel Aviv. You are in a totally different relationship to existence than they are. It's as simple as that. How that happened, you don't know.

 

PART TWO

 

There is a very important statement in the Work that is so large that no one even thinks about it, hardly. And that is:

"The only thing that can really be called thinking, is thinking from an idea."

It's referring to a Work Idea. It is connected with the notion of 'the difference between looking at life through the eyes of the Work rather than looking at the Work through the eyes of life'. When you catch that difference, you can make much clearer efforts.

The natural hope of any person who gets interested in anything, is that it's going to help them. What are they likely to expect from the Work? They see it helping them in 'life'. They hear thoughts that are far clearer than they are used to, and they say: 'oh yeah, that should help.' In a way the Work does help in 'life' because it helps you open your eyes. But it doesn't change life. It is not meant to change life – it's meant for you to be able to use life to change you. What does it mean to 'change you'? To give you what you need in order to grow towards your full potential.

The Work is aiming at self-knowledge, self-remembering, presence. The usual movements, within the body, the emotions, the mind, with the money, the family, with the this and that – are all disconnected pieces. A lot of irritation and a lot of frustration and a lot of everything which we call 'life'. And that is happening at a particular energy level – full of anxiety, for instance.

Work is aimed at deepening your sense of yourself, to a place that it is more real. To get you back to what is called 'Real I', which, it is said, is just behind 'Observing I'. Yeah. From Real I, there's a different vibration, a different level of laws functioning.

Look what The Work has to face! Everyone wants to feel better, to be happy. People want to be stronger – but from their natural conditioning they see that, basically, only as being stronger in 'life'. Getting what you want, more, increasing. Becoming more clever, more popular, more rich, more admired, whatever. That's 'happy' from a 'life' point of view. But, it's not stable, it's not reliable.

There is something really reliable – but it's in a totally different direction. You can't be busy trying to be 'somebody' and at the same time be a true 'something'  – your Essential Self!

To know the difference between a Work Aim and a life aim is a big thing. But how can you know the difference until you have 'worked them' both? You know, you've worked life, we work life, we know what it does and doesn't do. So, in order to know the alternative, you have to 'work the Work'. Work Ideas are totally new, you have to think about them, ponder what they mean, make intelligent effort, even to make some mistakes, in order to see whether or how the Work works. Then you will know the difference and be in a position to make the decision – are you, or are you not, going to work?

You know, real thinking isn't: 'should I say this to my mother, but my brother said . . . and he didn't . . . or . . . take money, don't take money . . . or travel and  . . .' That's what we usually call 'thinking' – do this job or that job, live here, live there, whatever. That's 'life' – that's not thinking from a 'Work Idea'.

Thinking from a Work Idea leads to a new kind of inner attention. It is developing inner sensing. One of our inner senses is, so to speak, the ability to direct our attention. Non-critical-self-observation, non-identification, self-remembering are 'posture' moves. From there you can choose not to be mechanical. To be ABLE to put your attention to what the mind is doing, or the emotions or body. To be aware how various things that happen, affect you.

For example: if you have an immediate sense of your emotional state and then someone goes 'boo!' – you jump or not – but you are aware of the vibration and can see what the mind does with it. The mind says: "oh, they just said 'boo' – but there's nothing to get excited about." You have a more objective sense of what happens and how it affects you.

A Holy Triad: Self-Remembering, Self-Observation, and Non-Identification. That gives you a chance to look, to be objective from your basic consciousness, which is basically you – and not just subject to the reactions of your centers. To be able to see from 'who you really are'.

That's a gradual process, as we are habitually glued to our reactions. It's as if we were looking at a picture and our nose got stuck in the paint. Big painting, fresh paint, and we get so close that we get stuck in the smelly paint – and hardly see anything. If you move back from the painting you are able to watch it. If the painting is a war picture or a love picture or a religious picture or a sexy picture, whatever – you are still able to watch it, look at it without getting caught in reaction. 

Work Aim is totally different from life aims: your reputation, your image in other people's eyes, or your own image of yourself. It's a different ball game.

Now that you've been studying and reflecting, you have become quite aware of your own mechanicality. You understand that life in its usual movements is, at best, a very 'jerky' business. If you are able to see that, it means you were able to remember yourself, to some extent. It's painful when you really see. It is no accident that people go blind – we close our eyes because it's so messy. But you have to see it, to know what it is – to pass through it 'on your feet'. In order to see it, as it is, objectively, you have no choice but to remember.

So, what I am suggesting now is that you've seen enough to give you a sense of 'yesh ve yesh' (there is this, and there is that). Perhaps that's what moved in you (Hagit) – the feeling of love, regarding me. But it's even bigger than that, because it's got you in it. That's the important thing – your 'presence' is the important thing. But there's no contradiction. You said at that time: 'I felt I wanted to see more of you, I wanted to participate more.' I think you used those words, or 'to be more active'. There is the beginning of evaluation. It also has to do with this issue of 'call and response'. You call, I respond, and then I say – okay, what does a person do with that? Because, you know, that's not the kind of thing to be wasted.

On the other hand, I call and you respond. Can we take that further? Your call to me and my response is one thing; my call to you is another thing. My call to you gets a certain response, and your call to me gets a certain response. Basically, what you are calling for and what I am calling for is the same thing.

What is the call for? Peace, Sanity, Truth. I wanted to say 'love' – but now I'll use the word 'normal'. Do you understand – normal, love. Affection to the dogs and cats, when you have it, is just normal. Or to children. Some people have a little bit more difficulty expressing that normalcy in certain areas. Some can be very normal with animals and not so much with children, for instance.

We want to become normal in all areas. How? First of all not to be compulsive – not to 'jump' with every thing that is attractive or a bit frightening. To be working on Being, so that all situations become 'normal'. With love for an animal, for instance, or a flower, you don't go grabbing at it. Normal is watching, first of all; it's being sensitive. When it comes to human beings it's most complex, most challenging. It's not just meeting a human being where they are, but you want, in human beings, you want 'normal' to be alive and growing – because that's what a human being is made to be. Love should become fuller, it should become wider – it should become clearer.

Take the inadequacy of sex, for instance. How far can you go with it? It has its limit. Oh, sometimes you can bring emotion or other things into it which, for a time, develops something wider. But basically, sex, is sex, is sex – you're stuck in a very limited room. There is certain satisfaction in touch, in relaxation, certain satisfaction in orgasm, but, I mean, they have their limit. It's not really 'flowering' in itself.

Thinking from the Work and thinking from life – are two very different things. To really know the difference you have to experience the results of Work effort. In life we have a lot of habits, and make sort of mechanical efforts. We must have some observation of that, of what generally moves us, and what the results are.

But you must also experience the results that come from another kind of activity – what is referred to in the Work as 'conscious effort'. It's useful to think deeply about this. You have made certain Work efforts, and if they were made with sincerity, you should by now have the 'taste'.

The more you have that taste, the more you begin to see: Ah, it is two completely different worlds. One is an effort in Being – the other is effort in everything else!