Great Amwell House, October 25, 1947
THE WORK-OCTAVE
II
We are taught that an ascending octave starts with Passive Do. The
Work-Octave does not start with work but with valuation. It does not,
for instance, start with thinking one can do and all the consequences
that arise from that illusion. To think one can do—to think, for
example, that one can easily change one's Being and become different
and behave differently if one wants to—is to think from Active Do.
What does it mean to start from Passive Do? Some people think they
can do anything by force. They think perhaps that they can compel
people to believe in God by violent measures and through fear of con-
sequences. This is starting from Active Do. It is starting from the wrong
attitude. To start from Passive Do is an entirely different thing. It is
very interesting to study at different times what it means and how one
continually tries to start from Active Do and continually fails because
one has not begun rightly. As was said, the Work-Octave begins not
with doing but with valuation. Since it is an ascending octave it must
start with Passive Do—for all ascending octaves start from Passive Do.
In this case, then, the valuation of the Work must constitute a Passive
Do.
Now your whole attitude towards a thing you value is quite different
from your attitude towards things you do not value. That is to say, your
psychological state is quite different in each case. You must understand
that a wrong psychological state is just as real in its effects as trying to
open a door with the wrong key. Valuation of the Work is the right
psychological state to begin with. Through valuation a thing becomes
precious to you. Through valuation you care for and remember a
thing. Through valuation you have patience to find out more about it.
Through valuation, if it is great, you regard yourself as of secondary
importance in comparison to what you value because what you value
is greater than you. The Work is greater than oneself and so the
approach to it is through valuation. There are many parables about
valuation such as the parable of the merchant who sought "goodly
pearls, and having found one pearl of great price, he went and sold all
that he had, and bought it," and the parable of the man who found
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treasure hidden in a field, "and to his joy he goeth and selleth all that
he hath, and buyeth that field." You can understand from them what
valuation means and so what starting from Passive Do means. The
Work says that a man must believe in Greater Mind. To me it was
evident at an early stage that this Work, this system that we study every
day, came from a mind far above ordinary mind, and one that was
possessed of a knowledge beyond human knowledge. So when we were
told that it was useless doing this Work unless one believed in the
existence of Greater Mind, no difficulties arose in me, because I had
already come to the conclusion that the system came from Greater
Mind—that is, from Conscious Humanity. Now if a man feels he knows
better than the Work, he cannot do the Work, because he cannot sound
the Note Do. To start from the Note Re, which is the application of
the Work to oneself, to make Re into Do, is impossible. I mean, it will
lead nowhere. The man is starting from the wrong place in himself.
He is putting the valuation of himself before everything else. He thinks
he knows and he thinks he can do. He does not see that he knows
nothing or that such knowledge as he has contradicts itself, nor does
he see that he always does the same things over and over again. That
is, he does not realize that his "doing" is simply the result of mechanical-
ness. He imagines he is fully conscious, has Will, can do, and so on.
You have heard sufficiently often how all these illusions have to be
broken. How? By a man slowly seeing for himself that they are illusions
and that hitherto he has been sitting in a public house drunk with
dreams about himself. This is called beginning to awaken from sleep
and there is a strange harsh taste connected with it, quite unlike any
of the tastes of life.
Now if a person does not value, and ascribes everything to himself,
his work will lead nowhere, because, as I said, the man is starting from
the wrong place in himself. He is starting from False Personality. You
will remember that what is done from Personality is done through the
force of external circumstances. External circumstances make you act.
You are not free. That is, you cannot do. External circumstances acting
on your machine cause it to react. This is not doing in the Work-sense.
The machine does, not you. In fact, there is no You—that is, no Real 'I'.
What you call 'I' is nothing but a changing collection of 'I's in the
Personality acted on at the moment by external circumstances. To
begin to do, one must stop the reactions of certain 'I's—that is, not do.
All you can do is to remember yourself.
To continue—if there is little or no valuation of the Work, it cannot
begin in the right place. It is a practical question, like sowing seed in
the right place. Of course, valuation increases as Re and Mi sound
stronger. But if you have possessed Magnetic Centre the Note Do will
sound early and clearly. Things will get cold, however, unless you
constantly return in your mind to the Work and relate it each day to
your self-observation and to all you remember and to what you want.
For what you want will gradually get more and more distinct.
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Now to turn to the Note Re—at Re you have to learn all the Work
teaches, to learn the language of the Work, and to apply it to yourself.
This takes a long time—in fact, one's life. Application begins with self-
observation—and you will not keep conscious of yourself in this respect
unless your valuation is strong enough to supply you with the necessary
emotional force to make effort every day from your understanding.
We all need to work. But do not criticize another's way of working.
If you must criticize, begin with yourself. It is not merely that people
have to learn the language of the Work: they have to learn the meaning.
It is not the words, but the meaning. And you can only learn meaning
by seeing the truth of it for yourself—because interiorly we are all open
to truth, while exteriorly we are all open to lies—that is, to life.
Now let us touch the Note Mi for a moment. Here you realize, on
a wider and wider scale, the city of yourself, of which you took yourself
as the sole inhabitant, and the Note Fa becomes possible—not in all
probability as you may have conceived. And it is here that you learn
to speak and understand the language of the Work. Here, for instance,
you know you cannot do, and here you know that others cannot do,
and so you do not speak always as if you or others could do. This already
is a great difference in you. And because you know and understand
yourself better and have lost many conceits, you know and understand
others, and cease to judge them. It is when you have reached this stage
that the Work itself may begin to speak to you internally, because you
have learned something of the language in which it speaks. This is why
the Note Fa becomes possible.