International Pathwork Foundation

I have occasionally used the term mask self in the past. The mask self and the idealized self-image are really one and the same. The idealized self masks the real self.

The post PL 83 The Idealized Self-Image appeared first on International Pathwork Foundation.

The attitudes of submissiveness, aggressiveness, and withdrawal are the distortions of love, power, and serenity.

I would now like to speak in detail about how they work in the psyche, how they form a supposed solution, and how the dominant attitude creates dogmatic, rigid standards that are then incorporated in the idealized self-image.

The post PL 84 Love, Power, Serenity as Divine Attribute and as Distortions appeared first on International Pathwork Foundation.

The instinct of survival — or self-preservation — aims at gaining, maintaining, and improving life. By its very nature it works against anything that destroys or endangers life. Just as the body needs health to live, so the soul needs health to live most constructively.

In order to live, one needs to be safe from destruction and damage.

The post PL 85 Distortions of the Instincts of Self-Preservation and Procreation appeared first on International Pathwork Foundation.

Growth, development, maturity and the healing of distorted soul forces lie in eliminating the pseudo-solution and replacing it with truth, which is always flexible and knows no rules.

It alone can provide true security, although the personality going through the process feels acute insecurity and anxiety when called upon to give up the pseudo-solutions.

The post PL 86 The Instincts of Self-Preservation and Procreation in Conflict appeared first on International Pathwork Foundation.

Some of you have wondered why at the beginning my talks were of a more spiritual nature, while lately the emphasis has been more psychological.

Although you all realize by now that true spiritual development cannot occur without clearing up distorted emotions, your knowledge is still largely theoretical and not yet conducive to a true understanding.

The post PL 87 The Next Phase on the Path: Questions and Answers appeared first on International Pathwork Foundation.

Obedience to authority has been encouraged by exponents of religion under the half-true and only partly valid argument that humanity was too much enslaved by its passions to be let free.

Therefore obedience had to be stressed in order to protect society.

The post PL 88 Religion: True and False appeared first on International Pathwork Foundation.

But why is the emotional nature generally neglected? There are good reasons for that, my friends. To gain more clarity, let us first understand the function of the emotional nature in human beings. It includes, first of all, the capacity to feel. The capacity to experience feeling is synonymous with the capacity to give and receive happiness.

To the degree you shy away from any kind of emotional experience, to that extent you also close the door to the experience of happiness.

The post PL 89 Emotional Growth and Its Function appeared first on International Pathwork Foundation.

Once you stop repressing your emotions, you will find not only definite individual negative emotions, such as hostility, resentment, aggressiveness, and envy, but also certain psychological conditions.

It is important to recognize their existence and their significance. Are they real? Are they mature? When you ask these questions, you will understand how they breed the negative emotions about which, consciously or unconsciously, you feel so guilty.

The post PL 90 Moralizing—Disproportionate Reactions—Needs appeared first on International Pathwork Foundation.

QUESTION: In a previous lecture about emotional growth and its function, a question was asked as to how to handle very wild emotions at a time when one has no helper available.

But what does one do if the emotions are so deep-seated, so deeply buried and repressed, for such a long time, that they simply will not come out to the degree one would like?

The post PL 91 Questions and Answers appeared first on International Pathwork Foundation.

Among the needs of the idealized self are, for instance, the need for glory, the need to triumph, the need to satisfy vanity or pride. In order to understand this particular process, you have to review how the idealized self-image came into existence.

The post PL 92 Repressed Needs—Relinquishing Blind Needs—Primary and Secondary Reactions appeared first on International Pathwork Foundation.