The Rudolf Steiner Archive

8. Anthroposophy as a Way of Life

[ 1 ] When discussing the relationship between anthroposophy and human life, it is essential to repeatedly draw attention to how, on the one hand, this worldview arrives at its conclusions and, on the other hand, how these conclusions can be assimilated by human beings. Anthroposophy, however, only arrives at its findings through the anthroposophical researcher first engaging in intimate inner soul exercises—exercises that enable him to move with his soul forces independently of the conditions of the human physical body, so that he can truly enter into that state which must be described as “the experience of the soul outside the human body.” But once, following such preparations by the anthroposophical researcher, the content of the higher worlds has been perceived to one degree or another and findings are available, then every human being—even the simplest of minds—can comprehend these findings with common sense and also make them their own. And today I would like to speak about what anthroposophy can become for a person through this assimilation of the substance of life—which a person can acquire by assimilating anthroposophical findings using common sense.

[ 2 ] I need not speak of what the anthroposophical researcher himself gains by penetrating into the supersensible worlds. For those who have even slightly set foot on the path leading into this world do not need to be told what they gain from the contemplation of these worlds. However, one must begin by considering the path into the supersensible worlds to some extent if one wishes to understand what a person who assimilates the findings using sound common sense actually gains from this.

[ 3 ] There are essentially three stages of inner spiritual exercises through which the anthroposophical researcher attains his goals, and today I will only very briefly mention what has already been discussed in the previous lectures I have given here over the past few days. The first stage of these spiritual exercises consists in strengthening the power of thought through a certain kind of practice, making it more intense than it is in ordinary life and in ordinary science; and through this strengthening of the power of thought, the human being then attains what I call imaginative thinking, or imaginative visualization. One transcends the pallor and abstractness of ordinary thoughts; one arrives at thoughts that have been transformed into images, yet in which one is just as vividly immersed [with the soul] as one otherwise is in the experience of an external sensory perception. Through such exercises, one attains a certain inner flexibility of thought and, through all of this, the liberation of thought from the physical corporeality of the human being, to which ordinary thinking is otherwise completely bound. When the spiritual researcher has completed these exercises to the degree necessary for his or her particular disposition, he or she comes to survey his or her earthly life since birth as if in a comprehensive tableau.

[ 4 ] But this overview is certainly an active inner process; nor is it mere recollection; this overview is a recollection of that which has been at work and active within our organism since our birth. Thoughts have become more intense and vivid; in doing so, they have also become something other than the ordinary abstract thoughts we carry within our souls. We have connected with thoughts that are, in fact, forces—namely, the very same forces that, when we are still very young children, shape, permeate, and energize our brain until we become fully grown human beings. It is only in this energized thinking that we experience the life forces. Through this, we observe our inner development here as earthly human beings from the moment of our birth.

[ 5 ] Once one has managed, through this comprehensive act of imagination, to bring the inner image of one’s earthly life before one’s mind, one can proceed to the second stage of the exercises for anthroposophical research, which leads one to what I call inspired knowledge. One must completely set aside the connotations these terms carry from tradition; one must not think of anything superstitious or the like, but only of what I myself am characterizing here.

[ 6 ] This second stage of supersensory knowledge is not attained by strengthening one’s thinking, but rather by treating the thinking that has already been strengthened in such a way that one removes from consciousness the ideas that are powerfully present there precisely through that strengthened thinking, and thereby appropriates what one might call empty consciousness. If one is able, in one’s state of mind, to [enter into this empty consciousness]—which now allows nothing to enter from the external sensory world or from the memories that are usually present—then, precisely by after first having strengthened one’s thinking—and now having emptied one’s consciousness once more—to the perception of a real spiritual world, both in our present surroundings and, in particular, to the perception of that spiritual world to which the human soul belonged in its eternal essence before it descended from the spiritual world through birth or conception to take on a physical body here. Within this emptied consciousness, one arrives at a true vision of that which is not present in ordinary consciousness and which may therefore be called the object of inspired knowledge, because it flows into our soul from worlds that are initially unknown to us—and is thus truly inspired by what is accessible to us from the supersensible worlds.

[ 7 ] If we come to know the immortality of the human soul in this way from one perspective, then by continuing the exercises—moving from mental exercises to exercises of the will—we can also arrive at the other aspect of this human immortality. Once again, one might say: On the one hand, the eternity of the human soul expresses itself as pre-existence; on the other hand, in the afterlife, it expresses itself as immortality. But the further progression to the third stage of supersensible knowledge then arises from exercises of the will.

[ 8 ] One cultivates the will so that it gains strength. I have already mentioned this is achieved by detaching the will itself from the thread of external events—for example, by reviewing the course of one’s daily life in reverse in the evening, by sensing a melody in reverse, by imagining a drama in reverse—[moving backward from the last scene of the last act to the first scene of the first act]—and so on, that is, in the opposite direction of the external course of events. If one attempts in this way, through self-directed activity, to master and develop the will—as one individually sets out to do in the manner I have described in my books *Outline of Esoteric Science* or *How Does One Attain Knowledge of the Higher Worlds?* — and if, in this way, one succeeds in detaching the will from the ordinary course of events and physical conditions, then, as a spiritual researcher, one enters into a true spiritual world. One gains a vision of death—of the soul’s departure from the physical body as the human being passes through the gate of death—and one gains a vision of the eternal part of the human soul after death.

[ 9 ] [Ladies and gentlemen], these are the three stages through which a person works their way up into the supersensible world. What a person has to say about these supersensible worlds after passing through these stages of knowledge can certainly be understood using ordinary human reason, provided one is open-minded enough. However, it is the case that this common sense must, of course—I would say—adopt a somewhat different attitude, in that it must become more flexible if it is to follow what anthroposophy has to say. For example, this common sense must adopt different approaches depending on whether it is following what the spiritual researcher has to say based on imaginative knowledge, or what he has to say based on inspired knowledge, or based on the third level of knowledge I mentioned, which I call intuitive knowledge. It is truly the case that anyone who approaches the findings of spiritual science solely through their common sense will feel compelled to look inwardly in a different way at what is gained through imagination, in a different way at what is gained through inspiration, and in a different way at what is gained through intuition.

[ 10 ] Just as one comes to know, through imagination, the supersensible aspects of the human being on Earth, and through inspiration, what a person has experienced before birth or conception, so too, by extending inspiration into intuition, one comes to know what the human soul experiences after death. But once one has come to know these two worlds in this way—what the human being comes to know as the supersensible in the physical world and what they come to know as the supersensible world before birth and after death—one also gains an overview of the relationship between these two worlds and comes to know something even higher. What emerges through intuitive knowledge is something even higher than both the sensory and the supersensible worlds. One comes to the realization of repeated earthly lives, which, however, did have a beginning and will have an end; but as regards the middle state of the human soul, it is the case that a human being first undergoes a life between birth and death and then an existence in a supersensible world between death and a new birth, and that this is repeated by individual human beings at the most varied levels. By following with the ordinary human mind what is thus drawn from the supersensible world in this threefold manner, it is precisely in this process of following that what can be gained from anthroposophy as the meaning of life develops.

[ 11 ] Ladies and gentlemen, Anthroposophy does not provide trivial rules for living; it does not offer trivial comfort for this or that situation in life or the like, but rather points to what the human being accomplishes on their own by striving to understand it. And in what a person goes through as they arrive at this understanding through their own inner work lies what a person can develop for themselves as a purpose in life through anthroposophy. Anthroposophy, therefore, does not impose a specific content on the individual, but rather points to inner work and can promise only this inner work—that, indirectly through it, it is able to give the individual a purpose in life, inner stability, and inner security.

[ 12 ] Let us consider the first stage: Drawing on common sense, a person tries to work his way toward an understanding of everything the spiritual researcher has to say based on imaginative insight—for example, about the forces that organize the human being as an organism and that are at work within him. Anyone who, so to speak, tries to reflect on what the spiritual researcher has explored will find that, through this process of working through the material, their thinking itself becomes more powerful and more active inwardly than it is in ordinary life and in ordinary science. Ordinary life and ordinary science do not necessarily require this inner activity, and that is precisely what, especially in our time, holds so many people back from anthroposophy. Today, people are accustomed to passively receiving everything the external world offers them; they would actually like to receive everything that comes to them—including knowledge—entirely passively, so to speak, and simply enjoy it. But by its very nature, anthroposophy must make a different demand on the individual. A person cannot merely indulge passively in thinking and imagining in an effort to understand; they must, from within their own inner being, make their thoughts more powerful by setting out to gather the power of thought at work within them, set it in motion, and, through active thinking, pursue what the spiritual researcher perceives. However, this is precisely why some people today feel repelled by anthroposophy. They do not wish to develop this inner strengthening within their souls; they would prefer to have everything handed to them while remaining passive. But it is precisely because anthroposophy demands this kind of understanding that it cultivates within the human soul that which leads to a certain independence of the personality.

[ 13 ] That, [my esteemed audience], is surely one of the first insights into life that a person experiences when seeking to understand the world through anthroposophy. It makes one’s personality more independent inwardly; it is, so to speak, inwardly consolidated through this kind of thinking—which one must practice—and through this, one gains the ability to relate to many things in life differently than is often the case today.

[ 14 ] [Ladies and gentlemen], one need only take an unbiased look at life to see how passively people today are devoted to life—and especially to spiritual life. If, for example, one attends a political party meeting today, one can observe all sorts of interesting psychological phenomena; one can see how the audience does not at all counter the speaker with inner independence, but rather absorbs what is presented to them as if through suggestion. Slogans would not have such power, and empty phrases would not play such a role, if people could counter what is presented to them in this way with greater inner independence. And this is precisely what one can gain from anthroposophy: that one strengthens and deepens one’s own judgment, and that one confronts what comes at one from the outside world with one’s full personality. This is, first and foremost, an achievement for life.

[ 15 ] But what we gain from this way of thinking—with which we pursue imaginative cognition—penetrates much more deeply into the destinies of human life. After all, if we use common sense to follow what the spiritual researcher says about the inner organizing power of the human being—when he speaks of what a person thinks and of what is more than mere thinking, namely a sum of inner, living forces—we must then align this thinking with the inner work that the spiritual researcher himself develops. If he wishes to convey his own ideas and thoughts—which are, after all, his means of expression—to people from the distinctive depths of his soul, he must speak in thoughts other than those borrowed from the external sensory world. This stimulates the person to unfold their active life forces; [(by reflecting on the spiritual researcher’s words], the person appeals to their life forces, to their vitality. As a result, the person brings their thinking down into their life, making it full of life, so that a certain [freshness, an inner] confidence and strength enter into their thinking. Thinking undergoes a complete transformation; it becomes inwardly more powerful through the study of anthroposophy. If one continues this for an extended period, this strengthening of thinking becomes evident in what one thereby gains for one’s organism.

[ 16 ] [Ladies and gentlemen], there is a great difference in the nature—and this is just one example to illustrate what a person gains from such a study of anthroposophy—between, for example, remedies that are entirely appropriate for certain illnesses and that have an effect on one human individual or another. One can find remedies for this or that ailment using the best medical methods and yet find that this or that organism remains unresponsive to an entirely appropriate remedy. But by appealing to the deeper forces of their organism, by thoughtfully following what the spiritual researcher has to say, people summon healing forces within their organism. For what I recently called the “body of formative forces”—which we can survey in a grand tableau at a certain level of higher knowledge—contains healing forces. It is not necessary for this invigorated thinking to act as a healing force from the outset; it can do so, but will actually do so in only the rarest of cases. However, whoever has awakened their thinking through the inner freshness of their thinking power enables themselves to be affected by remedies in a more favorable way than someone who has not refreshed their thinking power in this manner. [We see, in this way, that through our thinking we approach that which is more than our thinking—the life principle within us.] In this way, we can open ourselves to the possibility of being receptive to certain healing forces to which we would otherwise be insensitive. One could cite many more examples of how such a human intellect—which has strengthened and refreshed itself in the manner described—acts directly upon the human organism. We must certainly say: It is precisely what is attained in contrast to imaginative knowledge that not only makes a person stronger in terms of their thinking than they would otherwise be, but also strengthens them in terms of their physical being.

[ 17 ] Anyone who has approached anthroposophy in this way will soon notice that thinking becomes something that, in a sense, fills their physical body more and more like a current permeating it, so that they feel something entering their limbs; they become more dexterous, indeed simply more dexterous in performing the tasks of their body. People will discover how—by truly carrying out for themselves what I have described—they become far more dexterous in the ordinary tasks of life, whatever their profession may be. Anthroposophical work has an extraordinary amount to offer, particularly for practical life; in this regard, it already provides a purpose in life.

[ 18 ] [Ladies and gentlemen], when one looks at the second stage, which is attained through inspired insight, then the thinking is stimulated in yet another way when one reflects on what the spiritual researcher, through inspired insight, brings forth from the supersensible world regarding the nature of this supersensible world—whether it underlies the nature that surrounds us or is the supersensible world in which we ourselves exist before birth or after death. Then thinking feels stimulated [in a different way] in such a way that certain sensations within the human being are awakened, become fresh, and become powerful—sensations that, under no other influence, become as fresh and as powerful as they do precisely through the thoughtful exploration of what has been investigated through inspiration. Above all, one will see that, [by training one’s thinking in this way], one is able to penetrate nature with a sense entirely different from what was previously possible. I would like to say: Whereas before one might observe a plant, for example, by looking at its green leaves, its colorful petals, and, in a sense, what the flower reflects back from the sun—seeing these things with one’s eyes—one subsequently penetrates, as it were, into the very secrets of the plant itself. One feels, as it were, the sunlight absorbed by the plant pulsating within it. One gradually identifies with the way the plant grows from the seed, how leaf follows leaf, how it brings forth the flower; one’s inner life moves in step with the plant’s inner development and, in this way, with every single [natural process]. It is something like an immersion into nature, like the development of an elemental sense of nature. This is the distinctive feature of the anthroposophical science referred to here: that it does not generate some otherworldly mysticism, but rather brings the human being closer to reality, giving them a sense of nature through which they can gradually immerse themselves in the beauty and grandeur of nature, so that they grow back together with nature and can ultimately feel at one with it.

[ 19 ] I am not saying—[my esteemed audience]—that all these things cannot also exist to a certain degree through certain innate, elemental human dispositions. But what must be said is that even for those who, by virtue of their innate abilities, possess such qualities to a high degree, these can still be enhanced by following the insights of anthroposophical inspiration. Regardless of whether one has a little or a great deal of natural intuition, one can still enhance what one has in the manner described.

[ 20 ] And another state arises through the intellectual reflection on inspired insight: one learns to immerse oneself in a different way of feeling toward one’s fellow human beings. If, in a certain sense, one comes to possess one’s own independent personality through the intellectual re-experiencing of imagination, then through the re-experiencing of inspiration one enters into the innermost being of nature, but also, to a certain degree, into the innermost being of other people—again, something that should be taken into account especially in the present.

[ 21 ] Let’s look at how people today often pass each other by without understanding one another, or consider how few people there are today who can truly listen to others. Being able to listen to others is an essential part of understanding people. How often do we observe this today: when one person speaks to another, and if the speaker has even just a slightly louder voice, they cut the other off and push forward what they want to say, what they know—even though social life could take a completely different form if people were to engage with one another with understanding. But—[my dear friends here present]—those who thoughtfully pursue these inspired insights gradually realize that what they experience with other people is, at its core, something that belongs to the deepest innermost part of their own soul. Here we have already reached a point where anthroposophy must delve into its more precise findings in order to be able to present certain aspects of life in their proper context.

[ 22 ] In our [sensory and] emotional life, we as human beings reveal what we experience in the external world—that is, the results of impressions from the external world. But not all of these impressions directly form the content of our feelings or our entire state of mind during our waking daily life. Anyone who is able to study the nightly life of dreams, with its inner drama, even more closely than is usually the case, will already gain a sense of what anthroposophy can then elevate to complete certainty: namely, that deep within our inner life lies what arises from our intimate relationships [with the people] we encounter in life. Just as what we might not even take into account during the day—things to which we are not deeply attached—appears in our dreams in the most varied ways, so too do the relationships we have with others in our social interactions penetrate much deeper into the recesses of our emotional life than those things that come to our consciousness in daily life. There are relationships between people that penetrate deeply into the inner life. We stand between one person and another and converse with the other because life demands it of us—perhaps always only superficially—but there is much that plays out more deeply between people. [Even to those who are not researchers of the spiritual realm, the world of dreams reveals many things.]

[ 23 ] Everything we experience in this way [from person to person] forms the foundation of our inner life, of our entire emotional system. And much of what rises from the depths of this emotional life as disharmony—what rises in such a way that we feel as if we are permeated by an inner pain, an inner deprivation, or disappointment—all of this often stems from the fact that person-to-person relationships have formed, [which we have not brought into consciousness], that lie deep within the soul, that torment us and are just waiting for us to bring them fully into consciousness so that we can relate them properly to our own inner life. Sometimes the key to unraveling the mystery of our own inner life lies in knowing how to bring these experiences into consciousness in the right way.

[ 24 ] When we thoughtfully follow the results of inspired insight, we acquire an appreciation, for example, for listening attentively to others, but in a broader sense, for understanding our fellow human beings in general; and it is precisely through this that we develop a sense of social awareness in a deeper sense. We develop within ourselves that which makes us particularly well-suited to finding our place within the social order of humanity—for our own fulfillment and for the benefit of others, insofar as this benefit can emanate from us. A rich and fulfilling purpose in life is thus given to the individual, such that he or she influences all that is good and evil in humanity by having trained his or her thinking through the comprehension of inspired truths. One acquires knowledge of the world and of humanity through this sense of nature and understanding of human beings by attempting to penetrate the findings of inspired knowledge. Here, too, it is the case that anthroposophy does not make a person unworldly, but rather brings them closer to life and to other people.

[ 25 ] In our time, we experience many things that are called social demands. But what constitutes social feeling and sensitivity is—[as anyone with an open mind can see]—less developed in our time. But this is something whose development our time sorely needs, and in this regard, anthroposophy can and must fulfill a kind of mission for our time by leading people, in the manner I have indicated, to once again feel close to their fellow human beings. One may indeed say: Anthroposophy, through an understanding of what I have described, can serve to foster genuine, powerful love for one’s neighbor through an understanding of the neighbor. [And how is all this achieved, my esteemed audience? It is achieved when a person, by pursuing the inspired truths in the manner described, acquires a very specific, internalized sense of truth.]

[ 26 ] In everyday life, we have—[if I may call it that]—a logical sense of truth. Through our inferences [and judgments], we come to regard one thing as true and another as false; this has a certain logical character. As we then apply this logical character to the inspired truths, our entire understanding of the world becomes internalized. Our very sense of truth itself changes. We begin to perceive what presents itself as true within the context of the world as something wholesome. [This is a great achievement—my esteemed audience—when we no longer perceive a judgment or a conclusion merely as logically correct, but truly feel inwardly that what is right is something that heals, sustains, and strengthens the soul; so that we feel a sympathy in our perception for that which is true]; when error presents itself to us in such a way that we perceive it as something that makes the soul sick, weakens it, and evokes an inner antipathy. Through this, something emerges in the soul at a higher level that can be called a “psychic-instinctive life”—something that, precisely because it is instinctive, can guide us safely through life.

[ 27 ] We know that animals possess a certain instinctive sense of safety [with regard to physical life]; they avoid what is harmful to them as food and choose what is beneficial. Certainly, we must not compare the spiritual life with the physical instinctual life; but when one sees how something similar occurs in human life on a higher level—[since it occurs on a higher level in the spiritual realm]—one must speak of a psychic-instinctual aspect. [One comes to settle into the world in such a way that, when it comes to truth and error—just as with a color—one senses them with an instinctive certainty, just as an animal senses its food and poisons through its instinct. It is precisely through this—through reflection on inspired truths—that this soul instinct enters our human organism. It is precisely through this that we enrich the substance of our lives in a very significant way.]

[ 28 ] Human beings gain something—[inner stability], such as a sense of security in life—by being able to appropriate this instinctiveness at a higher level. And it is precisely because, through direct observation, we acquire the ability to perceive something as a healthy conclusion or, conversely, as something pathological and destructive, that we enable ourselves to develop a sense of nature and an understanding of humanity.

[ 29 ] If I may mention one more thing—[my esteemed audience]—we will delve even deeper into the findings of anthroposophy. What is needed above all as preparation for receiving the revelations of the supersensible worlds with one’s developed insight is a certain quickness of comprehension, a certain presence of mind. I have described how to develop these qualities in the writings *How Does One Attain Knowledge of the Higher Worlds?* and *An Outline of Esoteric Science*. Why is presence of mind necessary? Well, the moment the real spiritual world appears before you, you are no longer dealing with the same spatial and temporal conditions as before; rather, it is necessary to grasp a spiritual reality often at the very moment it appears. For if you are not quick-witted enough to grasp it at the very moment it appears, it is already gone again; and one cannot grasp it at all. It is a fundamental requirement for the anthroposophical spiritual researcher to acquire a certain presence of mind specifically for his research. Whatever he gains through inspiration and must grasp with presence of mind retains, when he reflects on it, something of the way in which it was discovered. For when a person reflects on it, they stimulate within themselves those qualities that led to the discovery of such a thing in the first place. [It is therefore a training of mental alertness to pursue inspired truths—if they are truly such—through reflection.] And in doing so, we in turn make ourselves more capable of living. For how much do some people suffer today when, faced with this or that situation in life that demands a decision, they are unable to reach one! The ability to make decisions is precisely what one can gain through the intellectual exploration of inspired truths. And this presence of mind is further enhanced when one becomes consciously aware of how many things—which previously required long chains of thought to comprehend—are now, so to speak, grasped in an instant, because one perceives them immediately as healthy truth or as a sickening, destructive error, just as immediately as one otherwise experiences a taste, a smell, or a tactile sensation. It is certainly the case that one develops within oneself the same vividness toward truth and error as one otherwise has toward external sensory perception, but that one develops this vividness as the experience of a higher, supersensory realm.

[ 30 ] [Well, my esteemed audience], the spiritual researcher then proceeds to explore what is revealed to him through intuitive knowledge by further developing and strengthening his will, so that this will becomes independent of the physical body and the human being is able to enter into the outer spiritual world. He is then able to stand within the outer spiritual world with his soul-spiritual being just as he stands within the physical world with the aid of his senses. This standing within the outer spiritual world, however, is essentially nothing other than the experience of one of the noblest human impulses on a higher level of life: it is an experience in love. It is also an experience of freedom; for a human being becomes unfree only by—as I already explained at the beginning of the 1890s in *The Philosophy of Freedom*

[ 31 ] explained in full detail—becomes dependent on his physical nature. The moment a person rises to the level of having impulses that he grasps through moral intuition, he becomes [in a moral sense] a free personality. But a person can also become a free personality in relation to their entire stance toward the environment—namely, toward the spiritual, supersensible foundation of this environment and toward the supersensible foundation of their own human being—when this supersensible foundation reveals itself in experiences before birth and after death, as well as in the experience of repeated earthly lives.

[ 32 ] What exists in an outer, spiritual world—and also in an outer, spiritual world of facts—is love on a higher level, the love that, even in the sensory world, frees human beings in a certain sense from what their physical nature would otherwise impose on them through their drives and instincts. There is a beautiful definition of love that Karl Julius Schröer once gave, which he elaborated upon in his book on Goethe, saying: “Love is the only human passion that is free from selfishness.” One cannot, however, say that love at its lower levels is free from selfishness; but one must certainly acknowledge: As love develops to ever higher and higher levels, allowing itself to be increasingly imbued with spirit and permeated by it, it becomes the very essence of the human being—as he merges his own being into the other being and immerses his own being within the other—thus making him more and more free from selfishness. And precisely because this love is transformed into a true power of knowledge through intuitive insight, reflecting on intuitive truths will also awaken this kind of love within the human being.

[ 33 ] Ladies and gentlemen, I am well aware of how the present-day audience recoils when one speaks of love as a cognitive power; nor are we speaking at all of ordinary love as a cognitive power. But when love is elevated through such [serious exercises of the soul and will] into the experience and perception of the spiritual world, then love becomes a power of cognition; then it is precisely through this loving immersion in spiritual beings and spiritual realities that one attains true objectivity—allowing the object to penetrate human cognition in its true form, and thereby also the entirety of human experience. It is precisely in this unfolding of intuitive knowledge—and also in the intellectual exploration of the results of this intuitive knowledge—that one discerns how a person comes to experience their own self, and also what hinders them from experiencing their own self.

[ 34 ] For, [my esteemed audience], anyone who looks impartially into their own inner self will become fully aware of how little their own self actually stands before their soul as an essential being. To a greater or lesser extent, what we call our “I” in everyday life is merely a synthesis of what is reflected from the external world, as if in a single point. But what the real “I,” the real self, actually is, does not become clear to ordinary consciousness at all; and if we were to live in such a way that our ordinary consciousness were not repeatedly interrupted by sleep, we would not experience the human “I” properly at all within the realm of ordinary consciousness. If we could go back to an experience of things in an uninterrupted course of our consciousness—uninterrupted by night—from birth onward, we would still find in it only a sum of external images of experience, but not the human “I.” We become aware of the “I” precisely because we repeatedly—even if we do not develop any consciousness in the process—withdraw from external experience into the state of sleep. [It is exactly the same when we look back and recall our lives.] We actually always see only what we have experienced during the day, and must, so to speak, always [view it] interrupted by sleep during the night. What appears through this interruption takes the form, in human life, of a collection of dark spots in the brightly lit space of memory. Were it not for these dark spots, we would have no resistance to the light that dawns upon them. We would experience only the outside world, not ourselves!

[ 35 ] But whoever, through intuitive insight, rises to a vision of repeated earthly lives, only then gains a vision of the true self of the human being—which passes through these repeated earthly lives and can be recognized only through this passage through them. Anyone who has gone through the process of how the spiritual researcher must express the nature of his or her research into repeated earthly lives gains a living understanding of the human self. But they also gain a living understanding of what knowledge in love is: merging with the external object of the spiritual world. And they gain an insight into the fact that we can actually experience our true self only when we become selfless. And it is precisely love—when described in its higher stages as the “only passion that is free from selfishness”—that simultaneously allows us, in our experience of the external world and in our devotion to it, to experience the power of our own self.

[ 36 ] It is a profound mystery of human nature that one only experiences one’s true self when one experiences the external world, embraces it with love, and is able to penetrate [the mysteries of the external world with love] in such a way that one can immerse oneself in it with one’s entire being. This underlies many sayings, such as Goethe’s: “One acquires one’s true self only by first losing it in order to gain it.” Only when we immerse ourselves in the world do we thereby live our way into our true self; whereas our ordinary self is ours only [in this way] because it is based on physical corporeality and thereby leads us away from our true self. But by cultivating such a conceptual understanding of the results of intuitive knowledge, a person comes to not only think, feel, or sense their self, but also to bring into a certain [context] that which is most important to them on Earth—that is the human will.

[ 37 ] How, then, do we actually relate to the will in our ordinary consciousness? When we are awake, we are actually fully awake only in our imaginative life; our feelings are, in relation to our ordinary consciousness, in a state similar to that of dreams, except that they occur differently in the life of the soul than dreams do; but the will is so deeply submerged in the subconscious that it is experienced like the states ranging from falling asleep to waking up. Let’s just take a moment to understand what happens when we carry out the simplest act of will, for example, when we raise our arm and hand. First, we have a mental image: the intention to raise our hand, and so on. Then what is mysteriously hidden within this intention penetrates down into the depths of the organism, and we know just as little about what is happening down there as we do about what happens to us from falling asleep to waking up—until we find ourselves awake again. In the same way, we find ourselves again when, after the volitional decision has been carried out, we look from the outside at the raised hand and the raised arm. [This is how we discover the volitional content of our thought.]

[ 38 ] In a sense, every single act of will is a falling asleep, a waking up, and an intermediate state of being immersed in sleep. By developing within oneself what constitutes the strengthening of the will—that is, liberation from physical corporeality—the entire will becomes, as it were, a transparent, all-encompassing sensory organ. Just as we have physical organs—such as the eyes—through which we see the physical world, so too does the human being, on another level, see into the spiritual world through his entire spiritual organization, and thereby also into the essential nature of his will. When, as a researcher of the spirit, one describes the essential nature of the will or the essential nature of the human “I,” one must clothe this description in such thought forms that the person who follows these thoughts with common sense gains within themselves a glimpse of how the will must be spoken of in this particular way—how [this deeper aspect of human nature, the will] is connected to the human “I.” This human “I” is, in essence, as deep within human nature as the will itself; it must be brought to the surface. But a reflection of this process of bringing it to the surface passes over to the one who reflects on the intuitive knowledge of the “I.” Through this, he cultivates energy for action within himself; through this, he strengthens his will.

[ 39 ] While, then, reflecting on imaginative insights elevates the personality and can endow it with independence, and while reflecting on inspired insights kindles the human spirit in the most manifold ways—toward a sense of nature, a true understanding of humanity, and an experience of what is healthy and what is sick in truth and error—the reliving of intuitive insight educates [the human will]. Those who educate themselves in this way will soon notice how this will becomes more energetic, and how it truly begins to love what is imposed upon them in the external world by their fate. Through this, we learn to accept our fate; we become strong in our will, both actively and passively, in the face of life; we also become strong in enduring suffering and pain as well as in experiencing joy. We become strong—not by turning away from the sufferings and pains of life; no, but through what is stirred [in our minds in both healthy and troubled states of the soul], we become more open to the joys and sorrows of life. Although we become more sensitive to things and experiences, the act of reliving these intuitive insights strengthens our will to such an extent that we can walk through life with greater integrity and bear our fate more confidently, whether in suffering or in joy.

[ 40 ] And as we develop the ability to relive intuitive insight, we feel connected to the world in a way that itself constitutes a religious sense of the world—one that represents what the deepest divine impulses in the world are capable of achieving through immersion in love for this world. The religious and artistic sensibility is kindled by this immersion in love in the world, to whatever degree it may be present. Anyone who adheres to anthroposophy in this regard will find something for themselves in terms of the further development of their artistic, [religious], and moral being if they adhere to what has just been indicated in anthroposophy.

[ 41 ] Thus, [my esteemed audience], anthroposophy—in seeking to speak of what can become the meaning of life through it—does not approach people with abstract sermons or exhortations, but rather by saying to them: When a person experiences what can be explored through it in the spiritual worlds, they acquire inner powers both for their thinking—which it brings to life—and for their feeling—which it makes more inner and more receptive to worldly phenomena—and they achieve a further development of their will, which it makes not only stronger but also more capable of suffering, but also better able to respond in the right sense to the joys of life.

[ 42 ] This is what anthroposophy has to say about the meaning of life that a person gains by familiarizing themselves with and delving deeper into anthroposophy: [a sense of security in life that they cannot attain in any other way]. Anthroposophy has nothing ready-made to offer people as a purpose in life in this regard, but only that which they can work out for themselves—and which they will, for that very reason, possess all the more securely.

[ 43 ] Life is something that philosophers view in a wide variety of ways: one sees it in a pessimistic light, another in an optimistic light, yet another in a more neutral light, and so on. But whatever one may think of these various nuances, anyone who looks back on what they themselves have gone through in life will surely agree with the saying: “Only those who must win freedom anew every day deserve it as much as they deserve life!”

[ 44 ] Life must be conquered by human beings every day in every sense. And that is good; for those individuals who would merely grow into life passively would not be able to gain anything from life for their own being, because the only things a person truly possesses are those he must conquer in life. So, if we recall the maxim that only those who must win freedom and life anew each day truly deserve them, we may now add: Anthroposophy, for its part, seeks to provide people with the means through which they can carry out this daily conquest!