If we wish to become esoteric students, we must train
ourselves vigorously in the mood of devotion. We must
seek—in all things around us, in all our experiences—for
what can arouse our admiration and respect. If I meet
other people and criticize their weaknesses, I rob myself
of higher cognitive power. But if I try to enter deeply and
lovingly into another person’s good qualities, I gather in
that force.
Disciples of this occult path must always bear in mind
the need to cultivate such admiration and respect. Experienced
spiritual researchers know what strength they gain
by always looking for the good in everything and withholding
their critical judgment. This practice should not
remain simply an outer rule of life, but must take hold of
the innermost part of the soul. It lies in our hands to perfect
ourselves and gradually transform ourselves completely.
But this transformation must take place in our
innermost depths, in our thinking. Showing respect outwardly
in our relations with other beings is not enough;
we must carry this respect into our thoughts.
Therefore we must begin our inner schooling by bringing
devotion into our thought life. We must guard against
disrespectful, disparaging, and criticizing thoughts. We
must try to practice reverence and devotion in our thinking
at all times.
10. Each moment that we spend becoming aware of
whatever derogatory, judgmental, and critical opinions
still remain in our consciousness brings us closer to higher
knowledge. We advance even more quickly if, in such
moments, we fill our consciousness with admiration, respect,
and reverence for the world and life. Anyone experienced
in these things knows that such moments awaken
forces in us that otherwise remain dormant. Filling our
consciousness in this way opens our spiritual eyes. We begin
to see things around us that we could not see before.
We begin to realize that previously we saw only a part of
the world surrounding us. We begin to see our fellow human
beings in a different way than we did before.
~ ~ ~
excerpt from"How to know the Higher Worlds", Rudolf Steiner
how_to_know_higher_worlds.pdf
Rudolf Joseph Lorenz Steiner(25 or 27 February 1861 – 30 March 1925) was an Austrian philosopher, social thinker, architect and esotericist.
At the beginning of the 20th century, he founded a spiritual movement, Anthroposophy, as an esoteric philosophy growing out of European transcendentalism and with links to Theosophy
