The Will to Evolve

The Will to Evolve

From our friend, Charles R.

It’s simple. Surprisingly simple. So simple in fact, that when we’re told about self-remembering, for that moment or two, we actually remember ourselves. But then we drift into imagination or become lost in an identification. We hear about it again, and again we are present for a moment or two, and again we disintegrate.

Without the tools, support and guidance that a school offers, introducing and prolonging presence is, at best, an elusive pursuit. And why wouldn’t it be this way? We’re a conglomerate of brains; moving, instinctive, intellectual and emotional, each with their own aims, wants and needs. Truly, Man’s name is Legion. It’s not that we lack the desire, but because there’s no unified conscious principle, the will to maintain the aim to be present gets lost among the many i’s.

Leonardo’s Saint Jerome may be seen as a poignant and painful portrayal of a man’s desire for conscious unity, but lacks the means to achieve his aim. He already knows what he wants, but the best he can do is beat himself with a rock to remind himself to remember himself. At some point even this noble effort will fail to produce the state he desperately seeks. Both the physical effort and ensuing pain will defeat his solitary will.

The same is for us as well. Without the necessary will to maintain our work, it dissipates. One element, probably the most important of all, is a teacher who has permanently crystallized his higher centers. He possesses the will to remember himself, always and everywhere. When we enter a school, we borrow, as it were, the will of the teacher to bridge the intervals in our efforts to be present. He directs the work of the school as a whole as well as individual students. He also has his own work to do, so by following the will of the teacher, we not only strengthen our own, we support his aims for the school. It’s a double-headed arrow with valuation, (or perhaps love?) at either end.

Often when we think about will, it’s usually in connection with the ability to do something, with an aim or goal. Each moment we make the effort to resist expressing negative emotions, each moment we transform suffering, each moment we externally consider someone, each moment we remember ourselves, are moments of will. The more we engage these practices the more we create will, the will to be present.

There is one thing in this world you must never forget to do. If you forget everything else and not this, there's nothing to worry about. But if you remember everything else and forget this, then you will have done nothing in your life. ~ Rumi

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Image: Leonardo da Vinci, Saint Jerome, ca. 1480, Pinacoteca Vaticana, Vatican