More on the Path of Alchemy, the Path of Service, and the Path of Suffering
Cosmic Awareness via Will Berlinghoff | Cosmic Awareness
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QUESTIONER: Yes and I thank you for that additional information, it’s been very helpful. This one here is from PE in England. He writes, “In newsletter 99-11, Awareness outlines the fastest routes to enlightenment and states that the fastest route is alchemy which It states is the process of changing one’s consciousness through such things as gaining knowledge which alters one’s ideas about life. In the second place is service to others and in third place is ‘suffering.’
This makes sense to me; however, what confuses me is when Awareness often states that when we pass over we will be asked one question and one question only: ‘How many did you serve?’ Surely if we are here to gain enlightenment and the fastest way to do this is to be seekers of knowledge which will give us a better understanding of life, obviously we will help others as and when we can, but to only be asked about how many we have served and not about what we have learned would seem to be ignoring most of what we have done here. Could Awareness please clarify this?
COSMIC AWARENESS: This is indeed an interesting and worthy question, and one needed at this time to help understand the statement given by this Awareness several years ago. The route that humanity is on, the physical incarnation experience the spirit chooses to have coming into physicality, is the route of suffering. The very essential paradigm of belief in this current physical reality, this current Planet A/B, is that it is a planet of suffering. One is born into suffering through a painful birth experience and one continues this painful suffering journey through one’s life, often dying in great pain and great suffering.
The motto ” No pain, no gain!” best exemplifies the paradigm of belief that is keynote to this dualistic reality that is being experienced by the majority at this time. Thus it is that suffering is a way of learning, a way of the soul experiencing its own separation from itself, for those who are in the strongest experiences of suffering are usually those who have no spiritual understanding, interest or awareness. Therefore, they do not see that perhaps they create their own suffering; they create their own experience for a spiritual reason, for Spirit simply does not exist within those who hold this belief so strongly.
The suffering is a unique experience but it is also a very, very slow way to reach comprehension of one’s greater spiritual nature and truth, and eventually, through many incarnations where suffering is paramount and the point of that existence, the soul as it is expressing itself in the physical form begins to question why suffering is so necessary. It is at that time that many start to move into roles of service and in service they are trying to alleviate their own suffering by helping others.
The question, “How many have you served and how well?” at this point reflects an expanded attitude that suggests that in helping another, one can promote one’s own spiritual growth. Service in the first layer or way, the way of suffering, is not necessarily available in the way of the second, the way of service. But service in the first is that when one goes back into awareness, into consciousness, back into Spirit, one realizes that self-service is not as effective in helping the soul advance and grow, as being of service to others, which is comprehended more at the second layer. This is why one returns back from the first way with the understanding that it has not served others and has not gained due to this, but it has had some deep and powerful experiences that were self-serving.
In the answer to the question when one has lived a life of pain and suffering and one is asked, “How many have you served?”, it is not simply the asking of the question that is important, but the realization of the answer one provides. When one realizes they have served no one else because in their selfishness they have only attended to their own needs and desires, they have not understood that all are connected, all are related, and that in helping others one helps oneself – then they realize in that flash of revelation that the point of the journey is to start to comprehend the importance of service, of assistance, of guidance, and make amends to this, and desire then to return back into physicality so that they can start to be of service.
There follows many lifetimes of such intent, but being that each and every individual enters with free will, free choice and one moves through the veil of forgetfulness where one forgets their purpose and intent, often many lives still will go by the wayside until finally this lesson is learned and one begins to live lives of service helping others. Now one can proceed from the second way, the way of service, and in many incarnations one will start to see that as long as one still involves themselves in the world of suffering and service being only directed to help those of suffering, which is on this planet considered to be of high moral ground and benefit, one will also finally begin to see that while this is of high value in some ways, it still confines and constrains the soul as it seeks to know itself, and as it seeks to ascend to a higher level of consciousness and awareness.
Eventually those who are in service will realize that in some ways they are also enablers; enabling that stagnation time after time, life after life of the soul that is seeking to progress but is trapped in this situation of service that is of a nature that reflects the moral needs but not necessarily the soul needs. This is not to say being of service is wrong or inadequate, it is simply saying that the soul seeks to evolve. Eventually it sees that if it is always simply serving others and foregoing its own growth and development, it will not reach enlightenment very quickly. It is indeed true that the path is a much steeper and quicker one than the path of suffering but it is still not as quick as the path of alchemy.
What the path of alchemy represents is that experience where one finally starts to understand that giving one’s power away to others constantly, never looking within, never dealing with one’s own issues, never seeking one’s truth, never finding the answers, will not lead one to that place of high spiritual understanding and awareness, and will not lead one to Ascension. Therefore those on the path of alchemy begin to understand the importance of putting oneself in the center of one’s own circle of experience and taking full and total responsibility for their lives, what they have done, what they do and what they will do.
In such focus, such centering, the soul begins to awaken and it begins to manifest in understanding and in consciousness. Thus it is that the individual on the path of self-awareness, on the path of alchemy, realizes that when they do for themselves, when they break forward and through the barriers of conscious-ness, that they become aware, they become enlightened and they are much more able to help others. Here is the irony of the path of alchemy: that by becoming self-centered one, in actuality, will be doing much more to help others than when one is simply on the path of service or on the path of suffering. In their knowledge of themselves they can move energies much more quickly and those energies can influence others on both of the other paths, while at the same time pushing the individual forward into their own heightened awareness and consciousness.
These three paths can also be seen thusly: the path of suffering is a long slow incline moving towards a point where one can move upward in consciousness. The path of suffering is the slowest path of all and requires the most incarnations to get through until one finally gets it right and moves on into the path and onto the path of service. This is a much steeper incline. If one was using degrees, the first path may be seen as a 15° incline, whereas the path of service may be seen as a 45° path. It is much easier and uses lesser lives to get to the next level, the breakthrough point, but it is still a longer way to get into self-awareness.
When one finally hits the breakthrough point, one moves into and onto the path of alchemy, the third path which is a 90° angle, a cliff face that one needs to struggle on and climb. There are far lesser individuals climbing the path of alchemy, and thus it is often a very solitary path, a very singular path, which creates much isolation and unfortunately for many, a separation from the majority who are still traveling the paths of suffering and service. Yet it is this path of alchemy that will truly bring one to the apex much quicker even though it is a more difficult path fraught with danger and difficulty.
Although this is so, it is the path of the soul to finally ascend to the apex. At the apex again the question will be offered once again, ” How many did you serve and how well?” In the path of suffering, the service is self-service; it is singular, and it is individualized to that individual’s soul journey. In the path of service it is more that one is trying to assist and help others, but is also moving towards a self-awareness that helping oneself is also necessary. Many martyrs are found on the path of service for they feel that simply serving others will be enough, but eventually they realize that being a martyr is not enough and they move into the path of alchemy.
It is on the path of alchemy where the question that is thus answered will be understood and realized, that in the attempt to understand and achieve higher consciousness one is working at a higher level of collective consciousness as well, and as each individual reaches Ascension, energies are brought into effect that will assist those below who are seeking to reach awareness and enlightenment. Thus it is that the path of alchemy is the path of greatest service of all, even though it would seem that one is self-centered. There is a big difference of course between self-serving and selfish, and being at the center of one’s circle, being centered in oneself, but this is a slightly different matter.
Finally this Awareness would say that all are part of the way of the soul as it seeks to evolve over the course of many, many lifetimes. In the end it is not that one is better than another, for the soul is eternal and has the opportunity to experience billions of lifetimes, not simply a few. It is more that it is a process of evolution, soul evolution, and as one becomes more and more spiritually attuned and spiritually aware, one naturally moves into the path of service and then beyond to the path of alchemy. This is the explanation of this Awareness at this time for the question of the three paths of spiritual evolution.
