SOME
THOUGHTS ON CONDITIONING
by Geoffrey
A. Farthing
Psychologists and philosophers say that most of us react to the world
outside and to other people as we do because of our ‘conditioning’.
This conditioning is the result of our up-bringing, our schooling,
the traditional thought-patterns of our social contacts, on our caste
or our place generally on the social ladder. Our religion, our politics,
even our nationality all condition us. A Hindu sees the world as a
Hindu, the Moslem as a Moslem, the Buddhist as a Buddhist. They each
have a code of ethics with certain things they may do and others they
may not. It takes much courage to break free of these conditionings
because by doing so we sever the bonds of our cult or even family.
There is also and very importantly the fundamental conditioning of
our experiences, of what has happened to us, particularly if it has
been painful or frightening. The psychological effects of these experiences
will vary with persons. A given experience may be shattering and enduring
for some but slight and short-lived for others. They will colour impressions
received through the senses of what happens to us around the person.
They will also affect our judgements and thinking. These tendencies
will be indicated in a person’s astrological chart.
According to our teachers, all conditioning results in an obscuration
of Truth. We cannot see things, people or relationships, etc. as they
really are, purely objectively. They are all coloured by the tints
of our conditioning spectacles.
When wise men are asked how we can be free of this conditioning,
their reply is to observe, to be aware of ourselves and see how we
react or how we behave according to the pattern of our particular
conditioning. If we can so observe ourselves in thought and action,
they say that we can in time become free of the limitations of the
effects of our conditioning.
It is very seldom asked, however, with what do we do the observing.
How can we become aware of our reactions? If we have only our conditioned
mind with which to observe our self, how are we to overcome both its
and our conditioning? Can the mind be divided against itself?
Some teachers advise us to practise the regular discipline of self-analysis,
particularly our behaviour towards others, against the rules of conduct
or whatever scale of ethics we have adopted. We can then see any unkindness
or where we have omitted to be as helpful as we might have been. This
tends to remove the risk of our incurring further Karmic debts by
harming others.
It is interesting for a student of Theosophy to note this seeming
division of mind. There can be two levels: one behaving or reacting
habitually, automatically in a conditioned way, the other capable
of registering and assessing these workings. Can one, however, observe
conditioned thoughts and reactions with the same mind and from the
same level as those thoughts themselves? Theosophy provides us with
some answers. One is the distinction between the Individuality and
the Personality. In theosophical parlance the Individuality comprises
the three upper principles of man, viz Atma, Buddhi and Higher
Manas, whereas the lower principles comprise the Personality,
viz. the lower manas, kama (emotion, desire, etc.), prana,
the Linga Sarira and the physical body. There is normally a
division between the Higher and the lower manas.
The real man, the Egoic individuality, is centred in the Higher
Manas, the seat of the man’s unit consciousness and of his
ultimate “I”-ness. This “I” is unqualified;
so too is consciousness itself, but not of course the contents of
consciousness: they are all conditioned or qualified. Consciousness
is a reflection, at our level, of the Absolute. It is without attributes
but it gives rise to awareness, and that is inseparable from the things
of which it is aware. It is these conditioned things that are the
elements of universal Maya during Manifestation. In other words, consciousness
at Egoic level is pure and unconditioned. We are told that the nature
of any experience of the higher mind is of the highest spiritual order.
This means that it is utterly impersonal, and its ‘objects always
in terms of principles rather than particulars. With the slow emergence
of higher mind promptings into the lower, conscience is born. The
man is beginning to know right from wrong without any rules
from within himself.
Turning to the lower quaternary as the Personality is sometimes called,
the mind is constituted of the lower three and a half sub-principles
of the manasic body whereas those of the higher mind are the
upper three and a half principles reflecting the very spiritual nature
of the Cosmos itself. The lower three and a half deal with the objectivised
Cosmos or being, in other words the personal man whenever he is in
incarnation. Out of incarnation these personality principles, together
with those of the kamic plane and the ‘life’ planes,
are dormant. They are represented by the continuing skandhas,
which are the conditioned residue from previous lives on the Egoic
chain.
Because of these conditioned skandhas there is no such thing
as an unconditioned personality. Even at its birth it is conditioned,
and this is quite regardless of any conditioning that may come later
during its infancy or its adolescent and mature existence. The lower
mind is the conditioned personal mind. It of itself can know no state
that is not conditioned - although consciousness, which during the
life of the man can be centred in it, is capable of breaking
away from that conditioning.
This conditioned mind is what makes us the persons we are here on
earth. It makes us what we are. Even Masters suffer from this conditioning.
Nothing exists which is not conditioned, i.e., bears the characteristic
stamp of what it is without which it would not be.
Concerning the Masters’ conditioning, we have Olcott’s
account of the Masters who helped H.P. Blavatsky write Isis Unveiled.
They all had their individual characteristics which reflected, for
example, into their handwriting and their style of writing. One or
two conversed easily in English, one or two had great difficulty,
one of them speaking only in French, and that one had a fine artistic
talent and a passionate fondness for mechanical innovation. Another
would now and then sit there scrawling something with a pencil and
reeling off to Olcott dozens of poetical stanzas which embodied now
sublime, now humorous, ideas. So each of the several ‘Somebodies’
had his peculiarities as do any of our ordinary acquaintances or friends.
One was jovial, fond of good stories, and witty to a degree, another
all dignity, reserve and erudition. One would be calm, patient and
benevolently helpful; another testy and sometimes exasperating. One
‘Somebody’ would always be willing to enlarge on his philosophical
or scientific explanations of the subject Olcott was to write upon,
by doing phenomena for his edification, while to another’ Somebody’
he dared not even mention them.
We are still left then with the question, with what can we observe
our conditioning? Are we to assume that even the Masters could not
do that? Surely the answer is that we can somehow elevate our consciousness
out of the limitations of the personal self into the realms of Higher
Manas which is free from the taint of personal conditioning.
The next big question is, how do we do this? Theosophy tells that
between the lower and the Higher Manas there is a membrane
impervious to start with for most humanity but which with later development
can become a bridge. As this bridge is formed, the Egoic ‘consciousness’
can pervade the personality and affect not only its mental insights
and understanding but its behaviour, via the kamic and astral
vehicles, i.e., by changing his or her inner promptings, desires,
etc.
Any modification of our thinking or the changing of our desires as
a result of Egoic influence is in effect a deconditioning process.
We are becoming more true to our real Self.
More than this, with the increasing liberation of our consciousness
from the limitations (conditioning) of the personality, the whole
centre of gravity of our being is rising into the spiritual realms,
and these spiritual realms are, with respect to our conditioned objective
world, unconditioned. Consciousness is becoming liberated and this
is the only true kind of liberation. It is with the mind functioning
at this level that the machinations of the lower mind can be seen
truly, dispassionately. This higher mind is an uninvolved, unattached
observer.
With this liberated consciousness we can, so to speak, invert our
attention and really see our conditioning from an unconditioned viewpoint.
However, this viewing does not, of itself, decondition us. We still
have to work through vehicles which bear the stamp of our personal
characteristics as was instanced by the description of the Masters.
Whilst we are operating in manifest vehicles, those vehicles must
always reflect what we are at personal level and they are always ‘conditioned’.
They still have to be controlled and ‘used’ as effective
tools. They are a means of action and information-gathering (experience)
at physical level.
So how do we really become unconditioned. The truth is that we cannot
until we are wholly identified with our Egoic Selves and there the
qualities of objective existence do not apply. A liberated consciousness
is the real and only state of freedom.
The laws of Nature apply even to man’s spiritual development.
Everything is at a specific spot somewhere along the vast evolutionary
path. Each human being is at this particular point on the way. As
this road is traversed, so faculties are developed and grow. This
applies particularly to the mental ones. The piercing of the membrane
between upper and lower mind (the building of the bridge of Antahkarana)
can only be successfully accomplished at the right stage of evolutionary
development. The process of building the bridge can certainly be started
by many of us. It is achieved by the development of faculty, by suitable
mental training, by exercises, of which meditation in many of its
forms plays a significant role. There are also other aids: the use
of consciousness-raising literature and suitable music. These stimulate
our upper mind sub-principles. Acts of self-sacrifice, of real altruism,
break down the barriers of our isolation from others and tend to give
us glimpses of the unity of the human family and of all things in
Nature. Compassion is thus born; this is a sensitivity to whatever
other people may be suffering or even enjoying in life. In sensitizing
ourselves we become able to share these feelings, not only in imagination
but truly so.
We begin to become truly virtuous - spontaneously, not practising
virtues as a requirement of any code of ethics. In real spiritual
growth there is no counterfeiting or pretending - that does more harm
than good. If we would grow we have to be virtuous indeed; we cannot
pretend.
It has probably been said by our erudite philosophers or psychologists
that the unconditioned man is virtuous. In The Voice of the Silence
we are told how essential are the paramitas, the virtues. “The
true pilgrim has a long path to tread”. This is a truism but
in the going the journey is full of a sense of purpose, rich incident
and, now and again, encouragement.
The process of deconditioning cannot start until a minimum degree
of Egoic consciousness has been established, i.e. until the man has
developed spiritual eyes to see and spiritual ears to hear.