Documents of the Order

Before starting an analysis of the text that makes up this theorem, it is helpful to make a few opening remarks. From the perspective of the OLE, the purpose of initiation is to gain mastery over ourselves and in doing so, to form ourselves into a normal human being. And by "normal" we do not mean ordinary but what a human being shoud be if his or her full potential is reached. Also, initiation has nothing to do with gaining special or mystical powers. Attica in the West does not have "secrets" nor do we possess "hidden" knowledge or a special teaching. Indeed, we instead tell all people who approach us, to learn to read the book of nature because all of these so called 'secrets' or 'special' teachings can be freely and openly found in Nature herself. But, unfortunately, we have lost the abilty to read this book and accordingly, we need a helping hand. It is the opinion of the authors, that the theorems are like sign posts which guide the adherent to discover the mysteries of creation for themselves. So the theorems are like 'keys' which have to be studied and applied in order to produce a change in us. Therefore, we make a clear warning to every adherent who approachs this work: you are about to embark on a long, difficult and hard path which will not lead to wealth and fame, but to something much better - a profound happiness that is born out of knowing who we really are.

Turning to the text of the theorem, we need to mark out a few terms for further consideration.

Q: What is a human being?
Q: What is personality?
Q: What is environment?
Q: What is experience?

Before answering these questions, let us first consider the first three words of this theorem ... "Every human being ...". These words show, right from the start, that the scope of this theorem and all the theorems that follow, is the whole of humanity. But this also raises the question what is a human being?

Of course, if you ask a child, they are perfectly capable of pointing out this or that human being. They would never mix up a human with other types of beings found in the enivronment around us - say: dogs, cats or trees. However, if you ask them to define what a human being actually is, they would be unable to do so. In fact, we would also find it difficult as well.

Let us leave this question for a moment and consider instead what can definitely be said about someone who is standing in front of us.

Amongst others, one of the first things we will notice is the gender of the person; then we may check to see how tall they are relative to us; the length of their hair; what colour it is; their eye colour; are they smiling or frowning; the firmness of their hand shake and so on. In short, we notice various physical characteristics of the person and do this automatically, even if we are not necessarily conscious of the various categorisations and comparisons we make. In other words, we start by checking out all the physical manifestations of the person or, perhaps better, how someone manifests themselves physically.

What else can we say?

On speaking with this person, we may start by noticing the tone and timbre of their voice. We might also note whether they are nervous, stressed or even if they are happy, unhappy, depressed and so on. That is, we will come to various conclusions about the emotions or feelings that the person is having, even though we cannot know exactly what this person may be experiencing internally. What we can say is that their emotional manifestation (or their psychical manifestations) are visible to us to a larger or smaller extent. This also matches what we can observe about ourselves - that we too have emotions and feelings happening inside us which leads us, in turn, to the not unreasonable conclusion that just as we have emotions, we expect others to have a similar internal world of emotions. Clearly, we all learn very early on, to have a sense about whether someone else is happy, sad, melancholic, angry and so on. However, we can easily misread such signs and must remember that we do not really know what a person is actually feeling. In any event, what we can unequivically say is that the person not only exhbits physical manifestations, but also has emotional or psychical manifestations.

What about the mental or intellectual level? We can observe that, just like us, this person also appears to be thinking and has ideas, because they tell us about them. We leave the adherent to make their own further study on this question: the study of their own and other people's manifestations.

Now we come to what can be called a universal observation because it holds true for all people. That is, each and every person or individual is thinking, feeling and physically interacting in this world, which also returns us now to our original question - What is a human being?

From what we have just said, a human being can be seen to have a certain set of common physical characteristics, which are distinct from other 'beings' such as cats, dogs, monkeys, trees and so on. In addition to those physical characteristics, we can also add the emotional (psychical) and intellectual (thinking) manifestations that human beings have. However, this does not necessarily help us to fully distinguish between ourselves and other intelligent beings such as dolphins, apes or monkeys. These other 'beings' also seem to "think", "feel" and "physically" manifest themselves in analogous ways to human beings. However, there is one thing that distinguishes human beings from all others on Earth, this is our ability to speak verbally to one the other. Communication through speech is clearly one quality that distinguishes "humans" from all other beings.

We can now return to the text of the theorem. It states that "Every human being has a personality of their own as dissimilar as are two beings of the same race and of a similar nature". In our own words we might say ... "Each and every person is unique" or alternatively, "that the personality of each person is unique".

Q: What is a personality?
Q: How can we 'prove' that there are no two personalities that are 'the same'?

What is personality?
Basing ourselves on what we have said so far, we know that a human being expresses itslef in the external world physically, emotionally (psychically) and intellectually (spiritually). So we can say that the person's personality corresponds to all the various 'external' manifestations that they express. We can also make the point that we can only see what is presented to us by another person. That is, we only see the manifestations and expressions of the person and we do not 'see' what is going on inside that person. Yet, we should ask ourselves ... what is behind those expressions and manifestations? and, do we know what is behind those same manifestations that are happening within us? As they are so familiar to us, we do not pay any attention to them as they just are.

Q: What is behind the 'expressions' and 'manifestations' of a human being?
Q: Can we truly know what is behind this 'phenomenon' that we call a human being?
Q: Do we even know internally what is behind the manifestations that we notice within us? (Our thinking, sentiments and sensations.)

How can we 'prove' that there are no two personalities that are 'the same'?

Here we need consider what makes one person's personality unique when compared to any other individual. If we quickly read the theorem again, we will notice that it is helpful on this subject because it gives us a way to research this question. That is, it suggests that we can compare similar human beings. Or as the theorem puts it ... that an individual is ... "dissimilar as are two beings of the same race and of a similar nature". Now, we could take one individual and spend the rest of our lives trying to find an identical human being. It is one way of approaching the problem, but it would obviously be a never ending task because these comaprisons would never stop as human beings are being born all the time. Another approach might be to take two individuals who are extremely similar, as suggested by the theorem. For instance, let us consider identical twins, or as the theorem says: "two beings of the same race and of a similar nature". Can we distinguish between such two beings?

Of course we have all heard apocryphal stories about how impossible it is to tell the difference between identical twins. One solution might be to ask one of the twins ... "can you distinguish between yourself and your twin"? As we can probably imagine, the answer would be ... "Of course... I am here and my twin is over there". Likewise, we can clearly see two individuals who are very similar to look at, but for sure, there are two individuals and not one. In other words, for two things to be "identical" or "the same", they would have to be composed out of the same atoms and molecules and be located in the same place at the same time. So if two things are composed of the same atoms and are located in the same place at the same time, then we would surely see only one thing. You of course, will have to find your own proof that each person is a unique or a dissimilar individual.

We can therefore say that we have proved, satisfactorily, that each and every individual is unique at the physical level and, based on this fact alone, we can say unequivocally that every human being is unique and dissimilar to every other human being. Accordingly, the totality of their manifestations - their personality - will also be unique.

We can Go a bit further, because we will never find two things that are identical or the same (identical) in this world. So even two leaves on a tree are dissimilar. Seeing that, we must additionally come to the conclusion that this difference or this dissimilarity is a law that exists in the physical realm. This law is so obvious that it is seen absolutely everywhere and we are very familar with it, so much so, we do not notice it at all. So, we do not give dissimilarity the attention it deserves. As the PROVERB says ... "familiarity breeds contempt". We should not ignore this law because it is absolutely essential not only for each one of us personally, but also has a tremendous significance for society as a whole.

Aside a: As we continue our studies of Dea's theorems, we will come back again to what we mean by a 'law'. In particular, we will return to the significance of the law of dissimilarity. At this point, it is sufficient to say that we are not speaking about the laws of mankind, which are ... "made to be broken" and are enacted for the benefit of one group of individuals over others, but is concerning the laws of nature or creation. These laws are invariant, are acting continuously and act always in the same way. These laws cannot be broken or avoided.

Aside b: We also do not mean to imply that dissimilarity automatically leads to 'conflicts' or to wars. For example, two leaves on a tree are disimilar, but this does not mean they are in conflict or at war one with the other. There is another factor at play here, which we can call the 'balance' or 'harmony' between all of the various dissimilar elements and parts. A quick glance at our own body will assure us of this fact.

Aside c: We are not discussing 'society' in theorem One either, as we are investigating the individual, and not the 'collective'. This subject, 'society' will be discussed in theorems 12 to 15.

Continuing on, we now ask:

Q: As an individual, are all your dissimilar elements or those elements that makes up your being, in harmony one with the other? (You must of course consider here what can be observed within your physical life, psychical life and your spiritual (intellectual) life and you should not forget the relationship that exists between all of those levels.)
Q: Are there any conflicts or battles going on within you?
Q: If so, what are they and why?

These types of questions are ones that each person must answer for themselves. No one else can (or should) provide those answers. We need to challenge ourselves by asking these difficult questions and by so doing, we will start to understand who we are, why we are and what we are. This is the in-depth self study which is absolutely essential if we wish to become masters of ourselves. Unfortunately, if we are truly honest, in most cases we usually find that we are more interested in gaining power over our environment and, in particular, power over other people rather than sorting out our own problems, difficulties and limitations. (The gaining of 'power' is usually expressed by the accumulation of money.) So we can say, the real problem is not 'out there' (waving our hand around us), but 'in here' (pointing at ourselves).

Moving onto the next two sentences of the theorem, we see that they are drawing our attention to two major elements that are influencing a person's personality. That is, the personality is affected by experience and the environment.

Q: What is environment?
Q: What is experience?

What is environment?
Environment can be defined as the totality of everything that surrounds us. Individually, this includes influences like our parent's DNA, the country of our birth, the local place where we live, our family environment, the food we eat, the schools we attend or have attended, our friends, society, even things like the local temperature at the time of our birth - (it seems that if the weather was particularly cold, for instance, then in mid-life we are more likely to be over-weight). There are plenty of other things which we are exposed to like television, radio, music, the position and orientation of Earth around the sun, the moon's phase and so on, which are the more obvious factors that make up the environment we have to contend with. As we have said, "environment" is everything that is visible or invisible around us and upon which we can act and which can act on us. We can therefore conclude from this that the main characteristic of our environment is that it includes everything that is external to us, no matter whether it be manifested physically, psychically or spiritually.

What is experience?
From the OLE's point of view, "experience" does not mean the daily events that happen to us in an unconscious manner. We are instead speaking about mindful experience in which we watch or observe what is happening to us and to other people, and to things around us. If we watch a child carefully, for instance, we will notice that both a baby and young child generally observe and watch things very intensely, by fully utilising all their senses. We often laugh when we see a baby placing each object they encounter in their mouth. However, they are simply trying to gather every piece of information they can on the object that has caught their attention - even its taste. Babies compare this person to that person; this object to that object; and through this intense observing, a baby and child starts to acquire experiences about the world and the environment it finds itself in. So we might say that one of the main characteristics of "experience" is the need or desire to make sense of the world (or environment) - first physically, then psychically and finally spiritually (or mentally).

Aside a: It is important to be clear what we mean when we use the terms physical, psychical and spiritual. For spiritual we mean the world or place inside us that allows us to think and reason, and from this perspective, thinking is a spiritual act. For psychical, we mean the world or place inside us that allows us to feel, have and process emotions. For the physical, we mean all the material things that allow us to come into contact and interact with the 'environment' that is around us. We do not, of course, exclude our own body from this.

Aside b: We should not ignore the fact that most external experiences have an effect on us internally as well. If we are obliged to have a flu injection, for example, then we expect to have a physical pain from the needle used. And because we dislike such pain, we may consider putting off or not having the injection at all. However, we also have a spirit or a mind that can reason and insist that we overcome these negative feelings. So internally we will have the conversation, ... "I don't like jabs so I don't want to have it", and on the other hand, our mind or spirit will say ... "it will prevent us having influenza and if we catch that, it will be even more uncomfortable and dangerous".

Aside c: In order to get a better understanding of what the Teaching of our Order means with respect to experience we often add terms such as personal, individual or mindful. We add these words to give the adherent the understanding that experiences is defintiely not the day to day events that are happening to us, whether what is happening is under our control or not. So the characteristic of experience, as understood by our Order, is that we should be able to explain the 'why' something has happened and why we acted the way we did. It is not enough to say ... "things just 'randomly' happen" and we promptly forget it all as a convenient excuse. The first thing we must do is to cultivate our observation so we are aware of what is going on.

Moving on to the last two sentences of the theorem, our attention is brought to how the environment and experience actually affect our personality. With regard to environment, the theorem says ... "As for manifestation, it depends on the more or less free environment in which the individual was reared. "For experience the theorem says ... "This personality ... is more or less strong, depending on the degree of the individual's experience.

Regarding these two sentences, and returning to our object of study, the child, one of the first things we take into account is how much freedom it is allowed. That is, if a child's upbringing is very strict then their natural manifestations will often be supressed and consequently, the child will not have its own views and opinions, but rather, the views and opinions of everyone else around them. In contrast, if the child is allowed more freedom, then there is a much higher probability that they will experience things for themselves and therefore will tend to have their own views and opinions due to their own individual experiences. In the first case,the personality will tend to be weaker, owing to the lack of personal experience, while in the second case, because of the freer environment, the child will have a stronger personality based on the broader individual experiences they have had.

Observing your own personality:

Q: Do you manifest yourselves truly?
Q: Do you manifest yourselves freely?
Q: Is your personality strong or weak?

and in a more interesting question:

Q: Is your personality true or false?

Responding to this last question and leaving the others for your own personal research, we can return to a young baby or child to find some guidance.

We said earlier that a baby, even at birth, will exhibit similarities and differences to every other baby. We can separate this further into the 'similar capacities' that all babies are born with along with the individual tendencies or idioscyncrasies that are different from one child to the next. These similarities, or these capacities are only potential in the newly born as they are, as yet, undeveloped. Here we can take as a simple example the ability of a baby to focus on what it is looking at. All babies have eyes to see, but to begin with, they are unable to focus properly even on their own mother or father. We can imagine that something similar happens with the baby's hearing and other senses as well. As for 'tendencies' we recall that every baby at birth, will manifest certain differences. Here I am thinking of the tendency to be: quiet; cry; grumble; happy; inquisitive; greedy; a reluctant feeder; or any one of numerous other possibilities. All of these are the tendencies or idiosyncracies that are distinct from abilties or capacities that a baby has to interact with the environment.

Now if we consider the grown up child as a young adult, we can say that their personality, generally, will reflect those core characteristics and tendencies which we noticed at birth. However, if the child was brought up in an environment that imprinted and imposed itself on the child as it was growing up, all those things that were not part of their underlying nature, then the child's character and its expression will be distorted to a greater or lesser extent. The net effect on the child is that it will exhibit a false personality or a distorted personality.

If on the other hand the child was encouraged to develop themselves according to their underlying tendendies and capacities, then their personality will be appropriately aligned and we can say the they will have a true or truer personality. For the most part, all personalities will be a combination: part true and false; part strong and weak; and so on.

Regarding whether the personality of the young adult is strong or weak, this may or may not align with the terms true and false personality. For instance, we can easily imagine the situation where some has, apparently, a strong personality, but this personality is false because the person expresses the strong opinions and views of everybody else but themselves.

Q: Is there anything further we can say in regard to the environment and experience?

The first thing to say is that we cannot completely separate the two things one from the other because we exist and live in a particular environment which will always provide us with a certain number of experiences (mindful or not) and those experiences can have an effect (real or imagined) on our environment.

Having said that we should also keep in mind that for the most part, a child does not undergo either an absolutely repressive environment or, on the other end of the scale, a totally free environment, but endures a little bit of both. From an experience point of view, we can suggest that a totally repressive environment would produce a total abscence of personal experiences or 'allowed' individual experiences, while within a totally free environment, the child would have a surfeit of individual experiences. As we have said the situation for most people will be somewhere in between.

Essentially, with respect to the environment, the child is either taught 'formally' in schools, colleges and universities or is taught 'informally' by family members and by their peers as they grow up and move through life. In both cases, this teaching is unconscious because the child simply accepts, without thought or judgement, what they are taught. Indeed, why would a child doubt what their parents are telling them?

This unconscious teaching or learning that comes from our environment, may or may not produce a distortion within us or, what we can imagine as, an impurity into our heart.

Aside a: This 'informal' or 'unconscious' influence is not an unresonable thing because a baby and then the child, has to learn very quickly how to exist and survive in the environment that it is born into. This requires that it absorb quickly whatever it can, however it can. This innate drive, means that, to begin with, a baby and then the child, discovers many things for themselves. Or we can say, they are "self-learning". And we should not forget that as parents, we will have the desire to look after and protect our children.
This then raises an interesting question: "What is unconsciousness and consciousness?"

Aside b: We tend to discuss 'environment' in terms of the baby or young child, but we should not assume that the environment can be ignored because we are adults. Far from it. Consider a person who is addicted to this or that narcotic. Is it advisable to put this person into an environment where drugs are freely available?

Aside c: We can say that modern educational systems are now beginning to include more of the 'discovery for themselves' mode of learning in schools. The advent of computers, and in particular the internet, has allowed children to lead their learning in all kinds of hitherto unavailable ways. Having said that, internet searching as a mode of learning, does not necessarily develop the child's own individual skills or their ability to come to their own opinions. This is because they are searching the internet for the opinions and views of others. So, as we can see, the internet itself is also imposing it's own environmental influence; but still we can say that things are somewhat better than in the days of learning by rote.

Q: How do we learn something?

To understand this question better, and we do not by any means believe we are giving an exhaustive explanation, it is helpful to go back and observe what a newborn does. A common statement often made when we first see a newborn is to say that 'all babies look alike' or 'they look like a bald man'. Of course, there may be some justification for saying that. However, when we actually look at a new baby we will easily notice that there are many differences. We have different sexes; one baby is smaller than another; one has more hair; and so on. Before long, we will also see not only these differences but also many things that are common or universal. What are these universal or similar things?

Well, every baby can move, cry and gurgle. In general, a baby interacts with its local environment, or expresses itself, by moving, making gestures like smiling and noises like crying. Because a baby will respond to light and sound, we can assume that all babies use their senses to come into contact with their surroundings. The other thing we can observe, is that every baby appears to be driven or animated to investigate its surroundings to a greater or lesser extent. Here I assume that there are no neurological reasons to prevent the baby from expressing this drive. This inherent drive to investigate and discover, is not that noticeable to begin with. However, over time the inquisitiveness becomes predominant.

So on the one hand, a baby is born with certain capacities or faculties and on the other hand, it has its own idiosyncratic tendencies and temperment. Also, we can say that there appears to be 'drive' behind baby to investigate the world it finds itself in. And we must not forget that memory is intrinsic to learning as the basis of making categorisations and comparisons.

We have also noted that we all have capacities or faculties that are similar between us - the ability to physically move for instance, and that we will also find dissimilarities - such as the idiosyncracies, tendencies and temperment.

Consider the following analogy: a carpenter will have a set of tools that are used to construct, for instance, a chair or a table. So it is normal for the carpenter to have a toolkit suitable for the job at hand. Now we would not expect the tools to make a table or chair by themselves. To actually make a chair or a table requires that the carpenter use his or her skills and those tools to fashion the available material into a functional object. So analogically our character corresponds to the carpenter's toolkit and our personality corresponds to the resultant table or chair, or better, the way the carpenter expressed the use of those tools in order to construct the chair. So, the resultant chair or table will not only be dependant upon the tools used to do the job, but also on the skill of the carpenter. In order to produce a good outcome, the skills of the carpenter needs to be developed through a consistent practice and application. Think of the first objects produced by a novice carpenter. Such objects will usually leave much to be desired, but after a few years of effort, the carpenter will have developed their own skills sufficiently to create a master piece if so desired.

What can we say about the carpenter himself? Perhaps, the carpenter corresponds to the driving force that is behind us ... the higher "self" or "ego" which animates us?

Q: How do we really know that there is such a toolkit and that something is motivating or animating a baby?

Again, by making our own personal observations. We can see babies listening and looking at everything that is happening around them. First, they will look at the mother and then at the father. You might even say that they appear to be categorising the similarities and differences between these two familar things. Now I say 'appears' because we cannot really know what is going on inside such a young one and we cannot recall either what it was like to be a baby ourselves. This is because there appears to be a memory restructuring that happens around the age of 7 years old, which serves to replace the majority of our early memories. So what I want to say here is that we should be careful not to project too many of our own opinions on such situations.

Anyway, I think it is safe to say that every baby appears to be able to distinguish between things quite early on - for instance, between their mother and father; this object and that object. We can imagine that there is be an internal voice within the baby saying ... "this one is taller"; "that one has long hair"; "this one has a high pitched voice, that has a lower one"; "this object is shiny"; "that object not so much"; etc. Of course, the child is obviously not making categorisations using words because it does not know a language as yet. This is yet another area that we make our own internal investigation - how we remember things. In any event, we can say, provisionally at least, that there must be some sort internally symbolic representation and memory of what has happened externally.

Returning to the example of a child who hears an unfamilar or loud sound. Usually the baby will move its head in the direction the sound came from. But how did the child know how to look in that particular direction? We might imagine that inside the baby, there is an internal representation of both the visual space and auditory space that exists around the child. So, when the child hears a new or loud sound, it knows in what direction the sound came from and then moves its head and eyes to look in that direction. But why two spaces? Well of course, it might be only one space or one internal model, but if we recall the unpleasant experience of getting water in one of our ears and the temporary loss of hearing on that side, we know that it is very disorienting and we have difficulty knowing where sounds are coming from. We can also have difficulty in understanding what others were saying. In other words, the internal audio map of the external world was temporarily distorted due to our blocked ear, and we lost the ability to know which direction to look when we heard a particular sound.

So what happens when the child sees a new face? We generally observe that the baby's attention is drawn to this 'different' face and we can imagine that the child is trying to place this new thing into one of the previous categories it has already formed. In other words, as the child undergos various experiences within the environment, it is continuously trying to make sense of the input it is getting. It makes comparisons of new things with previous 'similar' things or, put another way, there is a collecting or gathering of the 'sensory data' which is then compared to what was previously gathered. Within us, there is always some sort of sorting and categorisation of the sense-data we take in and a registering into various symbolic categories - or we can imagine that this is the case.

Take the example of a crude tree that you might draw for a small child. It is obviously not a tree and yet, a child will instantly understand that this rough-and-ready drawing is a representation of a tree. How is this possible?

In conclusion, we can say that every person will have their own particular characteristics, their own particular tendencies and will also have an underlying drive to investigate and discover for themselves the world around them right from the moment they are born. This drive to investigate the world is what allows a child to get up and walk, to learn to speak, and to begin manifesting their own particular personality. Remember, no one learns to walk by studying a manual nor do they study a book of grammar and syntax in order to understand and speak their own mother tongue. All these investigations or gatherings of experience are what allow us to start making sense of our environment and begin making internal predictions about how thing will turn out. That is, we all create our own internal physical, psychical (emotional) and intellectual (spiritual) models of reality that we notice in the surrounding world.

Aside a: Consider the simple example of a young child learning to catch a ball. As adults, we try to make the task easier by getting the child to cup their arms and hands and we throw the ball into their arms. However, if we pay attention, we can also notice that to begin with, the child keeps missing the ball when attempting to catch it and to help them we will say to them ... "keep your eyes on the ball". However, this is not necessarily all that helpful because a study of physiology tells us the the time it takes for the eye to feed positional information to the brain and for the brain to send the command to move the arms or hands in order to catch the ball, is simply not fast enough. So the attempt to catch the ball 'where it is', means that the ball has already gone. Still we carry on with the game and eventually the child learns to catch the ball.

So how does the child actually learn this skill? It seems that the child creates within it what might be called a "predictive" model or some kind of process which tells the brain where to catch the ball in - roughly - one tenth of a second in the future. In other words, in this case we are creating a model of the future, at least for objects moving in space.

Aside b: A similar predictive model also holds for conversations. Based on timings that scientists have made, it seems that we should not be able to respond in a conversation in the time that we actually do. This, then, is yet another example of us creating a 'predictive model' of something. In this case, about what a person is going to say rather than what they actually say. So we are already have an answer to what the person is saying to us - completely independant of what they actually say. We note that those 'predictions' are often not necessarily correct.

So every person is having experiences to a greater or lesser extent, is making comparisons of what they experienced against their internal model of previous experiences, and is forming various types of classifications. Here it is important to notice that the outcome of these comparisons requires some form of judgement so as to put order and structure onto the events of our experiences. We can give this sequences as follows:

'observe' - 'experience' - 'judgement'

By using the term judgement we do not mean 'judgemental' although this is often what people do. By judgement we mean that we are using our ability to compare things one to another and then decide how the elements that make up our experience compare to our internal representation of the world. This internal representation or personal internal model of the world is what, in the Order, we call knowledge. As we noted above we find an example of this in the way a baby learns to look in the direction of a noise.

So we now have the sequence: 'observe' - 'experience' - 'judgement' - 'knowledge'

Coming back to the text of the first theorem, we are told that the environment has a distorting effect on how we express ourselves, that is, our personality. And further, having our own individual experiences will help us form our own dissimilar personality rather than the personality that our environment is trying to impose or imprint on us. For instance, we have a common situation where someone is expected to pursue a profession dictated by their parents rather than the profession that corresponds to their own natural tendencies. This is an example of the environment imposing itself upon us and distorting and impinging on the expression of our true or genuine personality.

Now if we consider the difference between environment and experience, we might say that the difference comes down to how we get our knowledge. If we simply swallow what the environment is teaching us we will, by and large, apply little or no judgement. In such a case, the 'knowledge' we have gained, may or may not be true or correct. Or in other words, if we simply accept what we are told without question without our judgement being involved.

In such a case our experiences are selected by something other than ourselves and the knowledge, whether correct or not, is imprinted or is embedded within us. Now this is not to say that all experiences are without value or that they are wrong, bad or evil. This is plainly not the case. There are many examples, such as the belief that we should not kill one another. It takes a short time too accept and agree that killing and murder is not a good principle to follow. So what do we have to do, when we consider all those the environmental influences that have not passed through our judgement?

We can conclude, perhaps, that the theorem has already given us the answer. That is, we must revisit and rejudge all those things within us, that we simply take for granted. By doing this we will become, once again, the child that is continually asking the question 'why'. But as always, we must be careful about becoming too extreme in how we apply this. That is, we do not need to throw out everything we have been unconsciously stuffed with, even if this was possible to do. However, we do need to challenge ourselves to understand why we are acting, feeling and thinking in a particular way. If we cannot answer 'why' we are doing something, then the first task is to start digging deeper to find the reason and the source for this 'why'.

At the same time, we also need to pay attention to all our 'new' experiences that are happening to us on a daily basis, and must observe them in the manner of a baby. Although, I would suggest that putting everything into your mouth, particularly in public, might raise a few eyebrowses. The primary thing to remember is that instead of letting things simply happen to us in a passive manner, we must train ourselves to proactively watch the events that make up our experiences and we must pay attention to how we respond, feel and think about our experience.

At this point, we would like to discuss the official definition given in our Order for the term personality. That is: "Personality is the character proper of every being, together with their conscious individuality".

Now we might be an individual and we might be conscious, to a more or less degree, but that does not equate to what the Order means by "conscious individuality". Based on our character, our toolkit, and how we express ourselves, our personality, we can say that we are conscious to a greater or lesser extent. Due to the law of dissimilarity, the degree of the person's consciousness will be different from one individual to another. But the real issue here is what do we mean by the term "conscious". Let us return to the example of a new born baby. Can we say that a baby is conscious?

We observe that a baby has a certain amount of awareness, but can we say that its consciousness when compared to child of 7 or an adolescent of 18 years old? If not, then in what way are these examples different?

For one thing, we can say that an older person knows more, or has more experience, and this is certainly a correct observation, and this then immediately takes us back to the sequence discussed above:

'observe' - 'experience' - 'judgement' - 'knowledge'

Considering this, we might say that a more knowledgeable person is also a more conscious person, as long as we consider knowledge to be experiental knowledge and not just book or 'imposed' learning. This will complete the sequence above as follows:

'observe' - 'experience' - 'judgement' - 'knowledge' - 'conscient'

We would also emphasize our knowlege has to be of the right kind. If our knowledge is inaccurate or is plainly wrong or is gained without being personally corroborated, our consciousness is also without any real value. To give a silly example, we are in for a big (if probably short-lived) surprise if someone has implanted the belief or erroneous knowledge in us that jumping off the top of a tall building is a perfectly safe thing to do. The workings of gravity will govern us whether we believe in its existence or not. So one important measure of consciousness is how accurate or true to reality our knowledge is. Or how true our internal model is with respect to the actual reality that exists around us.

So, another way we can understand consciousness, is to consider how well we are able to predict what will happen if we act in a particular way. So, most people will not jump off a high building because their internal model, or their 'common sense', will tell them what the result of jumping off the tall building will be.

Now at first, our consciousness will mostly relate to ourselves and to how the mechanical laws are working. Such as bouncing balls and the effect of falling over and so on. That is, they tend to be quite self-centred or egoistic, but as our consciousness expands, we will also be able to take into consideration the effect of our actions on our family, then our friends, the local environment, our country and perhaps even on humanity as a whole. From this perspective, it is even possible that a super-conscious individual can 'know' the effects of their actions on up to the seventh generation. Alternatively, another way of understanding this, is to say that our conscient is that quiet inner voice, which we usually do not hear very often, which tells us what is right or wrong. It is that voice which, when we hear it, we know without doubt that it is right. We sometimes call this our voice of conscious.

Yet another way of viewing what consciousness is, is to say that we are conscious to the degree that we can explain 'why' we are acting, feeling or thinking in a particular way or manner.

Thus, from the point of view of the OLE, 'conscious individuality' is our own individual and particular consciousness that we have created through our own efforts. It is the outcome of the sequence: 'observe' - 'experience' - 'judgement' - 'knowledge'.

Along with this, we also give the following sequence regarding 'observation': 'paying attention' - 'noticing' - 'awareness' - 'consciousness'

Observing first starts by paying attention to what is happening to us. We then notice something because it keeps on happening - sometimes this is called making an association. Once we have picked something out of our observations, we can start to notice yet further things. We start to make associations between this thing and that thing; this follows that; and so on. We can then position or fit this new observation into our existing internal experiential model of the world, our knowledge. Or put another way, we start to create an understanding of some of the possible chains of cause and effect that exist. As noted above, we will, of course, find clashes between reality and our inner knowledge. The question then is, what do we subsequently do about it?

Let us now move on to a discussion regarding how you will need to apply the conclusions that you come to for this or indeed, any theorem. Here we have to ask the question: "why should we do anything at all?" The answer might be: "because application is the key to mastership". If your answer is "I am who I am" or "I cannot change myself" then initiation is not for you.

If a child did not have the drive to learn to walk and contented itself with only observing others, it would never walk. What is important here is to realize that this 'Truth' can only be really understood through application. If we consider the child once again, it has the capacity to walk; it is driven or animated to walk; the result is that the child learns to walk for themselves through the continual attempt to stand up and walk; this is an example of what we mean by the truth of application. If it were not true, such an effort would be without worth.

We can say that the first theorem implies that each person is unique and is dissimilar. This a a truth because we have proved the theorem to our satisfaction. However, in order to really understand and become conscious of what dissimilarity really means, we need to apply it to our lives. How can we do that? We might, for instance, come to the conclusion that, rather than always demanding that people conform to what I think should happen, I should start by respecting and tolerating what they think, even when I might not agree with them. Or put another way, I should start an exercise where I respect these differences that are expressed by other people. Many things can be learned from such an exercise not least of which is that we can make an exercise of being humble rather than dictatorial. This does not mean that we have to adopt everything that other people are saying or that we should unilaterally agree with them, because we too are allowed to express our own dissimilarity. But we must not simply pay lip service to this law and we must give it a fair trial. All this is a truth and as we have proved it to our own satisfaction that the law of dissimilarity is indeed a truth, then accordingly, we are obliged to change ourselves in order to align ourselves with this truth. If we do not do that, we are thinking, feeling and acting in a totally false manner. Or, to return the the analogy of the child - we will never learn to walk.

Q: Now when we say that we need to do some 'work' or 'application', what do we actually do?

There are no straightforward answers to this question. Everyone would like to have a set of "universal exercises" to resolve all their woes and problems, but no such thing exists. Having said that, there are some generic guidances that we can give to help you in your work on applying the conclusions you have come to in your study of the first theorem.

Aside a: We repeat once again that it is better for a person to come to their own conclusions regarding possible application of the theorems, than to be told what exercises they should do by the initiator. This is because those 'imposed' exercises may or may not be applicable to the adherent in question and ultimately, the adherent knows or should know, better than anyone else, who they are and what their particular issues and needs really are. Besides, our Order is trying to maintain the freedom of all our members and adherents rather than dictating what they should be doing.

Aside b: We have here an instance of the law of similarity and the law of dissimilarity. For example, in order to resolve our headache, we might take a drug (asprin for example) to take the pain away. This is an accepted approach of modern medicine, but is based on the idea that all (or most) people will react in a similar positive way to taking this drug. In the future, medical intervention will become evermore based on the law of dissimilarity, or bespoke treatments. Some of the new research using DNA interventions, for instance, are the precursors to this change, where treatments are tailored to the individual. In any event, to expect one set of daily practices to work for everyone is contrary to the law of dissimilarity, a law which we are at grave risk if we disregard it. If we can make our own exercises, we will make our own application of the theorems and the result will be far more effective. Besides that, acting from your own initiative will ensure that you will form and create your own free and independent personality.

Some Thoughts on application

a: No child is taught how to walk, they learn that for themselves. So no one can teach you how to sort out your own personality the way you want it to be.

b: A child learns to walk by a continuous struggle to stand up and then once upright, to take a first step. This means there are no shortcuts or quick solutions to our problems and there will always be a need to 'clear out' our current personality, or our 'being', of all the unneeded, unwanted or distorting items within us. So the only way to change something, or to learn something new, or overcome old habits, is to make the same exercise over and over, again and again. This is a law of nature, the law of repetition.

c: A child does not start running before standing up. In other words, we must set ourselves tasks which are orderly and acheivable through small baby steps. We do not try to pick up a whole mountain in one go. If we do that, we are bound to fail and then we are less likely try ever again. Therefore we should always set ourselves tasks that are achievable. Flashy and extravagant gestures or declarations usually have more to do with impressing other people rather than actually sorting out our own personality. Such exhibitions will never lead anywhere worthwhile.

d: When we make an exercise we must always also structure or order our plan of action. That is, we use our ability to think, reason and plan what we are going to do. We need to follow the following 3 steps:
1: Determine what we are going to do
2: Decide how we are going to do it
3: then, Do it

We can also add a fourth step which is a review of what we managed to achieve. This final step is important because it is the means by which we can our refine our future exercises so that they become ever more effective. Or we will find that we are make an empty exercise that has no benefit for us. To make real progress in our application of the theorem, we must realise what was blocking or preventing us from achieving our goal at any particular step along the way.

Example A:

1: You want to start a regime of physical exercise - swimming, walking, squash, Tai Chi or similar.
This is your idea, the "what you are going to do".

2: You now have to determine how you are going to make this physical exercise.
The first question you might ask yourselves, is 'why' you want to do this? Other questions you will need to cover here are things like: how often or the number of times a week you want to exercise; what type of exercise (cycling, walking etc.) you want to do; how far or how long; what day you will start your exercise; and so on. Often we deligate all this to someone else, a trainer for example. There is no harm is taking such advise, as long as you don't deligate your own judgement (your brain) to the trainer.

3: Then you have to actually start your exercise plan.
We suggest that you make a diary entry after completing each exercise session. This is very helpful when it comes to the next step when you review how successful your application has been.

4: The review
As stated, it is necessary and sensible to review your progress on a weekly or bi-weekly basis. The questions you want to address are whether you are meeting the targets you have set for yourselves. Do you feel better or worse. Why? Are you exercising too much? Is your nutrition (diet) good? Are you losing weight? Are your joints and muscles painful? Or in short, what have you noticed?

Based on your review, you will then modify the parameters you define in step 2 and continue only now using your modified exercise regime.

Now it is fine that you ask someone else to help you define what exercise you should be doing. This is fine to begin with, but ultimately, you should be taking charge of this for yourselves. Otherwise, you will not be following the path of initiation as expected by the foundress of our Order. Further, based on the first theorem, you are meant to be unique and dissimilar for a very good reason. If you are only doing what someone else is telling you to, it means you will end up conforming to the opinion as conceived by someone else rather than expressing and conceiving your own views and oppinions. In short, you must always attempt to manifest and express your own genuine, unique and true personality as much as possible.

Aside: By the term 'truth' we are not discussing what I happen to think is true or what someone thinks is 'their truth'. We have to distinguish between truth as used in common speech and the meaning used here. In the Order, we are not talking about whether a particular fact is true or not, whether it is correct or not, because otherwise, 'our truth' would allow us to say that we will suffer no harm if we jump off a tall building or that we can leap over tall buildings in one bound. Therefore, we must make a distinction between what is our 'opinion' and what is 'the truth'. Now one of the first things that we have to understand, and accept, is that the universe exists whether we part of this world or not and accordingly, the truth exists independent of us. So, our opinions are our own personal subjective understanding of what the truth is. Truth is essential something that is objective. Now if we had paid attention, we will have noticed that with all our studies and investigations that we have been making, in particular for the first theorem, we are always trying to find examples to support whether the theorem is 'true' or 'false'. If we could not find suitable examples then we would have good reason to doubt the truth of what was being stated. Where then, are we looking for such examples?

The answer is we look to creation that surounds us and not just at what this person or that person is telling us. This is what we should be doing. Or put another way, we test our belief, or what we think is true, against nature. It is not unreasonable, then, to say that the laws of nature are the truth, and as the theorems of our Order are derived from these laws, we can say that the theorems are the truth.

But of course, we do not expect anyone to simply accept that the theorems "are the truth". No, we insist that each adherent prove this truth to their own satisfaction.

Example B:

1: You wish to learn a new language. This might be a computer 'language' or a natural language like French or Chinese.

2: First you have to define how you are going to carry out this exercise.
Perhaps you want to learn French. One way of starting is to immediately enroll in a local college course and deligate the whole thing to the 'teacher' or you can buy one of the commercial language courses that are now freely available. This is one way. An alternative way might be to work out how you can learn the language by actually interacting with French speakers or make your own study. No matter which approach you take, as you did in Example A above, you need to define the how you are going to accomplish this task.

3: Then you start to following what you have specified in step 2, whether that be an evening course or you follow a program defined by yourself. Again you should be keeping notes in your diary after each lesson to record your progress; and you should not forget to include how the whole thing makes you feel.

4: The review of how you are doing.

Now, let us say that you chose to go to the local college to learn this new language, but nothing really happened or you only attended a few lessons and your appetite to continue attending the course is diminished. Here you have close to zero or a blank to review. So what do we do here?

So the review is:
Why don't I have the appetite to actually study?
Do I really want to do it?
Is it too difficult for me?
What do I meed to change to increase my desire to learn this language?

And so on.

We will now go on list some of the 'conclusions' that come from the theorem itself and from our study above.

Conclusions

1: Everyone has a personality.
2: This personality is unique - a one off.
2: This personality can be weak or strong (or somewhere in between).
3: This personality can be true or false (or somewhere in between).
4: Generally, the personality is distorted by or has imprints from the environment.
5: The personality is developed, evolved, formed or created by our own individual experience and through the application of our own judgement.

6: Add your own additional conclusions here ...

Further questions

1: What are your reasons (and I mean the real reason) for studying these theorems? (Is it to gain special 'powers' perhaps?)
2: Given that you do not have a genuine or true personality, what can you do about that?

3a: If you really want to form a true personality, would you change your environment and, if so, how?
3b: How might you change the experiences that you choose to have?

4: How will you improve your ability of observe things?
5: Is a strong personality the same as a true personality?

6a: What do you think are the fundamental 'abilities' or 'faculties' that are 'universal' to each and every person?
6b: What do you think is behind those faculties?
6c: What is animating or driving a person?

7: What is the reason for, or the purpose of the law of dissimilarity?
8: Make your own list of all the various things that has made up your own particular environment? (Initially, those things that has or have an adverse effect on you and then those things that are or were a benefit.)

9a: Make a list of your physical manifestations.
9b: Make a list of your psychical (emotional/sentimental) manifestations. (both internally and externally)
9c: Make a list of your intellectual (spiritual or mental) manifestations. (both internally and externally)

10: Is your internal self reflected perfectly in your external life and manifestations? If not, why not?
11: Apart from the physical, psychical and spiritual manifestations, are there any other expressions that can be noted in yourself? (either internally or externally)

LVV + KGP Nov 2018

Theorem One - Commentary by Attica in the West