The Difference between Psychic and Spiritual

Now and then in the course of the writings on this blog I use the words psychic and spiritual to differentiate between two states of being and knowing, stressing that the former is often mistaken for the latter, particularly by ex-materialists unfamiliar with religion, but the two should not be confused since they relate to quite separate realities. One might be said to be human, all too human, while the other, spiritual, is only known when an individual goes beyond the normal human condition.

The geography of the universe can be considered horizontally as is customary, but also vertically. It is useful, and quite probably accurate, to conceive of the totality of existence in terms of levels with the physical world understood as the lowest level, that in which matter is most material and consciousness most restricted. Though these very characteristics enable the development of mind which has to work to express itself and, through working, grows.

The world, then, has vertical as well as horizontal extension. If the lowest level is the most material we may understand the highest to be spiritual, and in this case the psychic level is midway between the two. I must emphasise that this scenario is grossly simplified but it has at least a symbolic accuracy and carries with it implications of a hierarchy of being which informs us that life is a unity in which there is an ordered diversity.

The psychic plane is higher than the physical (higher meaning freer and more expansive) and relates to it as the mind does to the body. But still it is the plane of subjectivity, being comprised of our thoughts, feelings, desires, beliefs and experiences, both individual and collective. This gives us the clue that it is largely a creation of the created. Spirit and matter are divine realities but the psychic plane is the product of human and non-human thinking and imagining. (Non-human as it contains entities that are of a different order to ourselves, entities known in folklore and myth). It is both formed of and contains the psychic impressions and experiences of all created life. This does not mean it is illusionary because these impressions may be grounded in created reality, but it is still a subjective world in which truth can only be seen through filters, the filters of our own limited consciousness. If we are operating in it, we interpret reality, we do not see it directly. Our understanding and perception is refracted through our mind and will always have a personal tint. You might say it is still sensually based which is why the psychic plane is regarded as a phenomenal world, phenomenal in this instance meaning a non-spiritual reality in which externals still dominate for remember that form-based thoughts are external to the soul.

If the psychic world is subjective, the spiritual world can be seen as purely objective. What this means is that our awareness of it is direct and untouched by personal factors. We see it as it is so person A sees and comprehends the one self-same reality as person B. This means that anyone who wishes to see spiritually must, to a large extent, transcend the limitations of their personality. Not deny their individual self but remove the psychic blinkers, attachments, desires, fears, conditionings, prejudices, both individual and collective, and so on that belong to the personal self. Spirit transcends sensory experience as it does individual thought. The world of spirit is that of first principles which are not mere abstractions but living realities fresh from the mind of God. If we would know these, truly know them not just theories about them, we must conform ourselves to them, and that means purify ourselves of the stain of sin which clouds our minds and darkens our hearts. Sin is always the mark of separation from objective truth.

The psychic world is a world of personal experience, even if that experience is of supernatural things. The world of spirit is that of objective reality. In the psychic world we are still functioning in the world of creation. The world of spirit is that of God himself.

If all this sounds bit abstract I have some good news. Jesus Christ is the embodiment of spirit as he is of truth, and deep contemplation on his person will provide an insight into spirit. Just make sure it is the real Christ you meditate on not a concocted figure by which I mean one of your own or of collective imagining which would be a psychic thing. If you need to ask me how to tell the difference I must say I can't tell you. That is something you must discover for yourself from intuition. But if your heart is true and your aspiration pure that will not be too hard.

A Word on the Cover

The cover of Meeting the Masters depicts Beachy Head near Eastbourne on the Sussex coast, a place I know well as it was where Michael and I were living when he died. I would regularly walk along the downs between the village of Meads and Beachy Head, drawn by the atmosphere of the place which was peaceful despite the cliff’s slightly sinister reputation. The springy grasslands and flinty chalk spoke to me of ancient England while the view of the sea from high up on the downs had something almost prehistoric about it. I would look across the waters, occasionally blue but more often grey, and feel connected to a time long before history. But that’s not the reason for choosing this picture as the cover for the book.

Sometimes it’s best not to try to interpret a symbol but just let it speak to the intuition without undue analysis. That way it feeds the imagination rather than the mind which gives it greater meaning. However on this occasion I want to say a few words about why I consider this to be such a suitable cover for the book. It’s not just because it’s a pretty picture nor is it because of the personal relevance, though both of these factors did contribute to the choice of image. Symbolically it’s a very suitable description of what’s inside the book. This book you can judge by the cover.

One of the themes of the book is that there are three basic levels to reality, the physical, the psychic and the spiritual, and wisdom arises when we perceive this and can correctly discern between them. These three levels are shown here by the land, sea and sky, otherwise earth, water and air. When we come to the limits of the physical world we find a new world, a world where thought can take exterior form and form itself is malleable to the mind, but that is not the spiritual world though it may initially seem so to the unwary. The psychic plane, like the sea, teems with life of all descriptions. There is beauty and mystery. There are warm waters to bathe in and depths to explore but there are also sharks and even monsters. Like the sea, the psychic world is constantly moving, changing, reflecting images from above that disappear when you touch them, and, as with the sea, you have to learn to swim.

To find a more stable truth we need to go beyond the sea to the sky, beyond the psychic to the spiritual, but that requires an immense change in our behaviour. It’s relatively easy to go from land to sea and most of us can swim to some degree at least. It’s not so easy to get up into the sky, and even when we do learn to spread our wings and fly we still have to penetrate the clouds, clouds of illusion, clouds of darkness which can only be dispelled by the heat of the sun, that is to say by the divine fire.

So there are these three worlds of existence that are shown on the cover. There is also a lighthouse which it is not hard to see stands for guidance and illumination. It is a little bit of the sun come down to Earth. Normally a lighthouse warns ships to beware of rocks but this lighthouse, which we are seeing from the land rather than the sea, is fulfilling a different function. It is pointing up out of the sea into the sky and lighting the way clear to heaven. It is the beacon of the Masters that is there to provide bright, clear, absolutely reliable guidance.

The one thing you can't see in the picture is the sun, though without it you wouldn't be able to see anything. That also has a meaning.

Words and their Meaning

The idea for the previous post came about from a question I received recently which suggested that we are approaching a new dimension of life (from the standpoint of those outgrowing the materialism of the modern world anyway), but do not have a developed language for it. That set me to thinking about language in general and how it can distort truth, especially spiritual truth, in ways which I outlined in the earlier article. The terminology used can carry certain inbuilt ideological assumptions which are taken as the basis on which anything else may be understood. But if spirituality has to be seen through the prism of a non-spiritual mindset how can it begin to be understood in the right way?

Here, though, I want to return to the original question and the specific points it raised. The questioner said that the word 'spiritual' is used in such a broad and vague way now that any real meaning it might have is easily lost. She said the same applied to words such as ‘psychic’, ‘occult’, ‘mystic’ and also ‘cosmic’ (as in cosmic consciousness), and asked if I could explain my understanding of the meaning of these words, some of which are used interchangeably and therefore confusingly. To a culture that only understands the world in terms of its outward manifestation these words are either meaningless or else amount to more or less the same thing but, in fact, they can be seen to have specific meanings which becomes clear when one thinks of the world beyond the physical in terms of various levels instead of dividing existence up into material and spiritual with nothing in between. My answer is below.

"You are right to point out that the language one uses in talking about spiritual matters is important because it conjures up ideas, and can either clarify or confuse understanding. I used to be quite loose with my language at one time because I knew what I meant but didn't fully appreciate that others might have a different understanding of the word employed. 'Spiritual' is a case in point. Now I try to be more accurate.

However, as you say, we are really only just approaching the non-material world now and don't have a good vocabulary for it yet. Moreover, as we generally approach it from the outside looking in, we don't understand it well which can lead to numerous difficulties, linguistic and otherwise. 

I use the word spiritual in different ways, depending, I must admit, on the context. Sometimes I use it just to mean non-material or even non-physical because, of course, the subtler worlds are not physical but they are still worlds of form, so material of a sort. This is where psychic comes in. I generally use that word to describe the non-physical but still material worlds, and to ideas and states of mind relating to them, emotional, mental and the like. For instance, the so called psychic powers are clearly not spiritual since they are extensions of the senses and have no true connection to what is beyond 'name and form'. In fact, much that is called spiritual today would be better termed psychic because it still involves the ego as a centre of consciousness and takes place in one or other levels of the world of phenomena.

So the spiritual, to be strictly accurate, is really only that which transcends the personal (as in separate) self and all that pertains to that self. In abstract and moral terms it has to do with concepts such as goodness, truth and beauty considered in their ideal forms, and, in human terms, with consciousness as distinct from the forms it might adopt. Thus it is the world of oneness beyond form in which we all have the innermost part of our being but which is only fully accessible when we have shed our identification with and attachment to the 'sheaths' or bodies that normally obscure it; that is, our differentiated aspect.

Occult is similar to psychic. As you will probably know, it simply means hidden so refers to worlds and powers which are above this physical one, and obscured from normal sensory perception. But the occult is not the spiritual any more than the psychic is, and once you have a rough idea of the nature of the inner worlds you see that many of them are no more spiritual in the sense of pure and holy than this one is. If duality is present, the idea of 'me' as a separate being, then spirituality is not. Occult techniques and practices may be effective on their own level but have nothing to do with true spirituality whether you think of that in terms of sanctity or enlightenment.They operate in and are restricted to the world of creation whereas spirituality is focused on the Creator or however you conceive of what is beyond the created order.

Mystic relates primarily to the attempt to attune oneself to the spiritual plane through practises such as intense prayer and meditation. The mystic tries to become one with God. I believe the word derives from a Greek word meaning closed eyes and lips, and that is a good clue to its basic sense which is the attempt to be still and know God. The mystic seeks to go beyond himself and the world of doing, and find his centre in pure being or love depending on how he conceives his quest. I see mysticism as the stage of going inwards after failing to find fulfilment in outer things. Some would say that, in its turn, it must be superseded by a more balanced approach which seeks to integrate inner and outer, and I would not dispute that.

As for cosmic consciousness, this is just a popular catchphrase as far as I am concerned. It was first used in the 19th century by the Canadian psychiatrist Richard Bucke to describe a brief  experience he had of the universe as a living presence. It was then taken up to refer to any kind of mystical-type experience in which the everyday self seems to be bypassed and the individual enters into a state of oneness. There are, however, various kinds of these experiences. They come about in different ways but one thing they all have in common, apart from the sense of being taken out of oneself, is that they are always temporary. They are not indicative of an advanced spiritual state, though the unwary or spiritually ambitious might take them as such. Personally, I don't use the phrase but, if one takes it literally, I suppose it would refer to the state of consciousness of beings who are not incarnate in this world. After all, the cosmos is pretty big and to reach a condition of real identification with it is rather more advanced than human beings, as they are here and now, can manage. But if it is understood simply to refer to the mystic's sense of oneness with all things caused by a connection to the soul level then I have no objection to it as long as it is understood that this is not some kind of ultimate state, beyond which there is nothing higher, but merely a glimpse into what awaits humanity when it goes beyond  its current dualistic (i.e. subject and object are separate) state of mind."

That's a brief run through of my understanding of various words that are sometimes used interchangeably. I'm sure that as our appreciation of spiritual reality grows and develops so will our language evolve, and become more capable of expressing subtler truths.

Further Thoughts on the Masters

I've been asked how I know that the Masters are real. Given that my only direct access to them came through a third party, how can I be sure that they exist objectively as beings who are what they say they are? Although, since they said very little about themselves, perhaps I should rephrase that to ask how can I be sure that they are what I claim them to be?

This is a fair question but it's one that comes from a certain level of consciousness, namely one rooted in logic and reason. Now logic and reason are important in this field, as in all others, for without them a spiritual approach can fall into all kinds of superstitious error. We need them to act as essential checks and balances on intuitive impressions and religious beliefs. Nevertheless, on their own, they cannot discern metaphysical truth, and they are superseded by direct spiritual insight. I appreciate that phrase is meaningless to mainstream contemporary opinion but that's because such opinion has limited itself to the external world of appearances, and cannot accept as real what is beyond the reach of the physical sciences.

The facts are as follows. During periods of meditation I was spoken to by what appeared to be discarnate entities through the medium of another human being. These voices (as there were more than one) referred to themselves as Masters on some occasions but, when asked what they actually were, told me just to think of them as messengers from God. They made no high-flown claims for themselves but used this term merely as a simple description.

Some possible interpretations of this experience are;

1. The medium, Michael Lord, was a fraud and was consciously making this up.
2. He was doing this without being aware that he was doing it, i.e. it came from his subconscious mind.
3. Uncoordinated mental energies, which are the product of human thought and imagining, floating about in what might be termed psychic space, assume a kind of semi-life for a period when attention is directed towards them, at which point they can take on a semblance of reality and be channeled by the psychically impressionable.
4. Deceitful spirits on the astral plane were amusing themselves by posing as spiritually enlightened beings.
5. This was a standard channeling experience in which discarnate beings adopt the persona of enlightened spiritual masters in order to absorb energy from their listeners.
6. It was what it purported to be.

Perhaps there are some other explanations but I think they would be variations on one of the themes above.

Let's look at some of these interpretations.

1. If Michael was a fraud on a conscious level he showed a skill, intelligence and insight that he did not begin to approach in any other part of his life. He also never tried to exploit this talent in any way, either with me or publicly. The voices were not his and the sense of power and authority that accompanied them were certainly not his either.
2. Much of what was said above applies here too. Michael's unconscious mind would have had a wisdom not possessed by, or even approached, by anyone I have ever met or, for that matter, heard of. It would have had the ability to assume several quite different and very powerful individualities, and known things about me that Michael did not and could not know, as well as tell me things about myself that I was unaware of but could see on reflection were true.
3. I think this explanation accounts for quite a lot of mediumship. Usually nothing very profound or insightful comes from it. It tends to lack focus and purpose, consisting, for the most part, of bland spiritual platitudes, already known and accepted by the medium. It is more general than particular, the very reverse of my experience.
4. Also quite common in channeling circles. It can range in content from elaborate descriptions of the inner cosmos, heavy on occult detail, to flowery, devotional communications for the spiritually sweet of tooth. The Masters who spoke to me fell into neither category, being exclusively concerned with pointing out to me the ways in which I was bound to the lower self or ego.
5. In my view many teachings from so called ascended masters fall into this category. There are, however, significant differences between these teachings and the ones that came through Michael. The most significant, though the least obvious to an outsider, is the matter of vibration. The spiritual intuition will always be able to determine what has a truly sacred quality and what doesn't. Unfortunately a lot might seem sacred that certainly isn't, and that is especially so these days when spirituality has been made a good deal more democratic, not entirely to its advantage. On a more concrete level, I might point to the fact that the Masters who spoke to me made no claims as to status, were solely interested in spiritual instruction, required no praise or worship, never discussed such fantasies as a New Age of love and brotherhood, did not encourage dependence, and did not give me their names or discuss anything to do with the personality. In contradistinction to the often long and rambling communications from the psychic plane theirs were always short and to the point. There was no fat on their messages.
6. This is obviously my preferred option. In fact it is the true one!

The Masters don't have a very good press in some quarters nowadays because there has been a certain amount of foolishness spoken in their name through the channeling phenomenon. In addition, some aspirants dismiss any kind of spiritual help as 'dualistic', and say that truth can only be found within and independently. That may well be so but it does not preclude help and guidance from a true teacher which all of us need at some stage on our journey, particularly to point out ways in which we might deceive or delude ourselves, an ever-present danger on the spiritual path. It is also believed in the non-dualistic world that a realised soul, once the body has died, is gone for good. But the assurance of Jesus that he would be with his disciples to the end of the world completely contradicts this. As does the fact that the Masters told me that they were closer to me than my own skin, and always knew what was in my mind. Hence my view that some liberated souls may cease to have any contact with the phenomenal worlds but others retain that in order to direct, guide and serve suffering humanity.

When it comes down to it, it is up to each individual as to whether or not he or she can accept the reality of spiritual Masters. Meeting The Masters was not designed to convert anybody to that belief but to confirm to those already open to it that their intuition is correct. It can be a cold, dark world for the sensitive aspirant trying to make sense of life and its purpose. The knowledge that there are beings of light and love who have us in their care and under their guidance, even if we can't perceive them, should be a consolation and a source of strength when life's trials seem almost overwhelming.

The Return of the Gods

Over the last 50 years or so spiritual enthusiasts of various types have regularly talked about the return of the gods to human consciousness. The idea is that about 2,500 years ago contact with the numinous world of the divine gradually became closed off as a more rational, egocentric, individualised form of consciousness evolved, slowly at first but rapidly from, say, the Renaissance period onwards. This was a necessary thing from an evolutionary point of view. We had to become completely focused on the material plane in order to develop certain qualities, to do with mind principally, so that we might become more rounded, self-organised and integrated individuals. Essentially so that we might learn to think. That meant a degree of inner isolation. But now we are living in a world of complete separation from the gods and it is time to restore contact with them and their world of archetypal reality, though this time from the point of view of who we are today with our more autonomous and intellectual mental attitude.

I sympathise with this idea. We are certainly cut off from the inner worlds, much to our detriment. We desperately need to become more aware of the greater reality of the universe, and its spiritual aspects. But is a return to archaic ways the right thing to do, even with the always stressed strong proviso that this should be in the context of who we are now and not as passive as it used to be? Who or what were the gods anyway? Were they really divine or were they often beings who existed in the between worlds by which I mean the worlds between this physical one and the true spiritual worlds? No doubt some were divine, as in what Christians would think of as angels, and some were demons and there were others between the two, non-physical beings but not especially moral or benevolent. When we look at the old gods and goddesses, whether Egyptian or Greek or Indian or Norse or whatever, most of them are not particularly admirable in spiritual terms. This may reflect the limitations of the people who worshipped them but it may not. Please note that I am accepting the gods as real beings and do not just see them as objectifications of components within the human psyche though I am not disputing that they were that as well. However, in the past it was contact with the being that activated the corresponding area of the psyche. A return to the gods would mean opening the mind up to these otherworld beings.

I think the advent of Christ changed everything. To attempt to return to a pre-Christian spiritual attitude, as so many pagans and occultists and shamans and so on do, is spiritually atavistic. These people mostly explore the so-called astral plane, a psychic world in which thoughts and feelings are things. This is pretty much the world of the gods. I say pretty much because there are exceptions but these are rare. The gods are not God even though there is often an underlying belief that each one of them can potentially offer an opening to the Absolute of which they are something like manifested aspects. But I don't go along with this. If you approach the Absolute through the gods, you will not advance beyond the level of the gods which is the level of created beings, albeit an inner level. Since Christ came, the gods are spiritually redundant and they will remain so. Whatever numinous power they may once have had has been taken up by and refocused in him and they are mostly now psychic shells which can be reactivated by desire or thought or concentration but cannot be re-spiritualised to any high degree.

We most certainly do need to open our hearts and minds up to the higher worlds, and also learn to see creation as full of soul, a living thing shot through with spirit. But to do this through the old gods, or god forms as they might better be called, or even some modern equivalent is not the way. The old ways of approach to the divine have been superseded. They cannot be updated. For one thing, they belong to a completely different moral universe. For another, the forms they took reflect the archaic consciousness, especially when they are derived from the animal kingdom. Form is much more important than some spiritual people realise. Outer and inner cannot be disassociated as much as you might think. The sort of outer through which you seek to access the inner will largely determine the sort of inner world you encounter, its quality and spiritual height, depth and truth. It's not all one and the same thing, whatever popular spirituality might say today.

If by the return of the gods you mean a reacknowledgment of the spiritual plane by materialistic people, I have no quarrel with you. But if you say that this can be effected through the agency of archaic pagan religions and god forms, then I think you are mistaken. This is more the approach of occultism than genuine spirituality, the difference being that the former seeks power or knowledge or experience while the latter is driven by love. The occultist may very well acquire all those things for himself but he will not find God. The advent of Christ really did change everything, and for all time.

An Experience of Demons

I apologise for touching on such an unpleasant subject, but I recently experienced what I feel was very probably a psychic attack and reflecting on it afterwards has given me a clue into what damnation might involve. The attack took place in the form of a dream, though it was like a waking dream in which you are neither completely asleep nor completely awake, and consisted of a pair of incidents in which a sort of mind disintegration appeared to be attempted. I'm not saying that could have really happened in this case but it did give me an insight into what might be a permanent state if a particular course is followed to its bitter conclusion.

Damnation is loss of the soul. Loss of the soul must mean loss of the self and a self is lost when it is disintegrated into existential chaos. The demons' work is destruction, the returning of cosmic order to the black pool of nothingness. This may be what damnation is. There are many forces in the modern world that aid and abet this disintegration, preparing the ground one might say, and some of them are happily pursued by foolish people because they give a kind of false ecstasy as the moorings of the mind are loosened and a horrible freedom is offered, freedom from the boundaries of order. In music we have rap, electronic dance or rave music, heavy metal and punk. These all dissolve structure into chaos in a more or less brutal fashion in which the rational mind is aggressively broken down to a sub-human instinctual maelstrom. The examples of modern art and literature follow a slightly different, possibly more cerebral, course but to the same end. Order into chaos. This can potentially be valid if a new and higher order is formed from the chaos but that is a rare, very rare, thing, and is certainly not the goal of the examples I have cited. These are all to do with a sort of celebration of chaos. When you break boundaries there is an initial ecstasy as the freed energy flows out but it is soon dissipated and you have nothing left.

My experience was as follows. My next-door neighbour had a party in his garden. Only about 10 people but the houses share a wall and it might just as well have been in our garden. There was loud talking, music playing and raucous laughter. This neighbour is frequently noisy until late. The main group broke up around midnight so I thought I could go to bed but had to open the window because it was so hot. There were a few people left, talking and music still going. I put in ear plugs but could still hear them.

At around 1.15 I had had enough so stuck my head out of the window and asked them to go inside, none too politely I admit though I wasn't rude. They said they were talking about something important and it was none of my business. I should just shut my window. I said it was my business if they kept me awake and that I found their behaviour unbelievable. Besides, I could hear them even if the window was shut which would also make the room like an oven. Then I gave up and went back to bed. They carried on for another 20 minutes and finally left. 

I suppose I got to sleep around 2. Then I had this very vivid dream. I dreamt they had come back again but this time with some other people and were making a lot of noise. I tried to put my head out of the window but it had been covered up with some material so I couldn't. Eventually I got the material off and put my head out to ask them to be quiet. As is the way in dreams the scene had changed slightly. The garden had moved a bit but the main thing was the people were now skeletons that glowed a lurid green colour. They mocked me and made more noise. Then they began attacking me psychically by which I mean they projected evil at me, some of which was expressed as this same lurid green in the form of 'dark light'. I can't describe it better than that, I'm afraid. The psychic attack grew stronger so I prayed to Jesus for protection. But when I tried to banish them in the name of Jesus Christ I couldn't say the words 'Jesus Christ'. It was as though my brain had been drenched in a kind of treacle which blocked it. Eventually, though, I succeeded and I found myself back in bed with them apparently gone.

But that wasn't the end of the dream/experience. While lying in bed I felt someone or something come in through the window with, of all things, (don't ask me to explain!) a supermarket trolley. This creature went through the room and downstairs where my two children sleep. I got up and followed it and found it outside their room with its trolley. I could clearly sense the aura of naked evil. It wasn't just bad. It was evil in a very pure way, dispassionate but absolute. Again, I tried to banish it using the name of Jesus and again, I couldn't get the words out. The thing began attacking me, not physically but on a spiritual level which I have known before and is very different as you feel as though something is trying to disintegrate your mind which will not function properly. Finally, I managed to call on the Masters, the teachers I describe in my book, and this thing was driven away. I knew I couldn't have dealt with it on my own. Then I woke up.

Now, a conventional psychologist would say that I had been disturbed by the neighbours and my mind made up this scenario as a result. I'm sure that had something to do with it but I am also convinced that is not all there is to it. I think the initial disturbed state created a kind of entry through which evil beings could attack. I am well aware most people would dismiss this as preposterous or else as evidence of mental derangement, even paranoia, but there was a very clear difference between this dream and the normal run of the mill sort, few of which I ever remember. This was more intense and vivid by several orders of magnitude. I was not particularly frightened because even in the dream world I find I can trust in God, but it was pretty terrifying purely as an objective experience. 

Assuming this was a psychic attack, and, as I say, I have experienced similar things before though not often or to quite the same degree, I have to ask what its purpose might have been and what it can teach us. The purpose can perhaps be summed up by some words of the Masters who told me that the greater progress you make the more you will be assailed by evil in all its forms. This is because every person who breaks free of evil by turning to God represents a nail in the coffin of evil, a step towards its eventual destruction. 

But why was it allowed? I don't wish to self-dramatise and I have a suspicion that one is not supposed to talk very much about personal inner experiences, but maybe one of the reasons this happened to me is that I have this blog and can share such experiences so that if anyone reading encounters something similar they might know what to do. And what to do is very simple and very traditional. Call on Jesus Christ. You might find, as I did, that something tries to stop you doing this. In my dream my brain turned to mush but I called in my heart as well as my head and I was answered. I also realised my utter dependence on God. In your waking existence you can pretend this is not so but in the vulnerable sleep state where you are exposed to the psychic plane the room for self-deception and self-aggrandisement is very much reduced. Everything is more raw and open.

I reflected on the 'things' that attacked me and I came to the conclusion that they were more like things than beings with individual consciousness. The being in the second episode particularly just seemed to be a kind of embodied malevolence. After first appearing as a dark shadow, it took the form of an old friend of mine but the eyes were pools of dead malice. I believe that demons are lost souls that have had their individual selves hollowed out and have become vessels for evil in a ghastly parody of saints who can be vessels for God. The saint has offered himself in love to God and God fills him with himself. The lost soul has by his thoughts and behaviour given himself to the devil but instead of being filled by goodness and truth is taken over and used. It's as if the devil literally consumes them and then operates through them though he can only do so to the extent of their personal attainments of power, intelligence and such like. It's horrible to think of and I apologise for putting this thought out there but it may be a reality of the spiritual universe of which we should be aware.

As I was writing this I sudden realised that's exactly what the Nazgul were in The Lord of the Rings. As usual, Tolkien's spiritual instincts are pointing in the right direction. Then the figure of Weston occurred to me as described in C.S. Lewis' Perelandra where we are shown a human soul that has been taken over by the devil and entirely lost its humanity. Weston has become a 'thing'. His soul has been disintegrated and its life energies taken over by Satan.

There are many forces in the world today that are seeking to prepare us for spiritual dissolution, a dissolution that may well happen to those who have been sufficiently 'softened up' in this life after they depart this life. I have spoken of certain forms of music and art. Drugs are another obvious example but there are also ideologies that seek to reduce everything to a uniform oneness. Shun these like, for they are of, the devil. Focus on the Good, the Beautiful and the True which are necessarily hierarchical and separative, two words which have been given a bad connotation today but simply mean not everything is equal which it could not be for absolute equality can only exist in nothingness. Always aspire upwards. Do not deny or dismiss the lesser for it too is of God but know that things are closer to or further away from him. They are not all at the same distance even though he dwells in all things.

Evil is running riot all over the world today but we should not pay it too much attention. The manifestation of good conquers evil more effectively than actively fighting it. We should certainly be wise to evil but the more we focus on the good, the more we can help bring that out. I have written this piece because of an experience a couple of nights ago but I would like to end it by praising God who is the author of all good and who waits to welcome us into his kingdom if we will accept the invitation.