Cultivation of creative fantasy brings serenity of soul, inner harmony, and contentment

For a sound emotional life, we have the fine word ingenuity. * [Sinnigkeit, the gift or capacity of inventive or creative fantasy.] Being creatively fanciful means that something ingenious occurs to one. Children ought to play in such a way that the fantasy is stimulated, that the spontaneous activity of their souls is stimulated, so that they have to reflect about their play. They ought not to arrange building blocks according to patterns: this merely develops pedantry, not creative fantasy. We are developing creative fantasy when we let children do all sorts of things in sand, when we take them into the woods and let them form little baskets out of burs, and then stimulate them to make other things of burs stuck together. Things which cause a certain inventive talent to expand nourish creative fantasy. Strange as it may seem, such cultivation of creative fantasy brings serenity of soul, inner harmony, and contentment.

Moreover, when we go for a walk with a child, it is good to leave him free to do whatever he will, provided he does not behave too badly. And, when the child does anything, we should show our pleasure, our participation and interest; we should not be unresponsive or lacking in interest in what the child produces out of his own inner nature. Even when instructing a child, we should connect what we teach him with the forms and processes of nature. When children reach an older stage, we should not then occupy them with riddles or puzzles taken from newspapers; this leads only to pedantry. On the contrary, observation of nature offers us the opposite of what is afforded by the press for the cultivation of the emotional life. A serene heart, a harmonious life of feeling, determines not only mental health but also bodily health, even though long stretches of time may intervene between cause and effect.

Source: Rudolf Steiner – GA 130 – ESOTERIC CHRISTIANITY AND THE MISSION OF CHRISTIAN ROSENKREUTZ – VI. Jeshu ben Pandira II – Leipzig, 5 November 1911

Moon Cycles – Art of Carol Herzer

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Faith, Love and Hope

Faith, love, hope, constitute three stages in the essential being of man; they are necessary for health and for life as a whole, for without them we cannot exist.

Just as work cannot be done in a dark room until light is obtained, it is equally impossible for a human being to carry on in his fourfold nature if his three sheaths are not permeated, warmed through, and strengthened by faith, love, and hope.

For faith, love, hope are the basic forces in our astral body, our etheric body, and our physical body.

Source: Rudolf Steiner – GA 130 – FAITH, LOVE, AND HOPE – I. The Third Revelation to Mankind – Neurenberg, 2 December 1911

Translated by Violet E. Watkin

Chakra Goddess-Power – Art of Carol Herzer

Things perhaps that are completely forgotten, but influence a man’s entire state of health and of mind

We would understand many human lives if we were to know what has entered the hidden depths during the course of life. We would understand many a human being in his 30th, 40th, 50th year — we would know why he has this or that inclination, why he feels so deeply the cause of his dissatisfaction — we would understand many things if we were to trace the life of such a man back to his childhood. In his childhood, we would see how parents and surroundings influenced him; what was called forth during childhood in the form of sorrow and joy, pain and pleasure — things perhaps that are completely forgotten, but influence a man’s entire state of health and of mind. For what surges and rolls down into the hidden depths of soul-life out of our consciousness, continues to be active there below.

Source: Rudolf Steiner – GA 143 – Reflections in the Mirror of Consciousness, Super-consciousness and Sub-consciousness – Munich, February 25, 1912

Translated by May Laird-Brown

RADIANT-PRINCESS  Art of Carol Herzer

Previously posted on 3 December 2018

How absurdly a person may err when he judges merely by externals

I will give you an example to show how absurdly a person may err when he judges merely by externals. He might say: ‘I know of a man who was a great adherent of the anthroposophical conceptions. Now the Anthroposophists declare that health is always improved by their teachings and even that life is prolonged by them. Fine teaching this! The man died at forty-three!’ 

So much they know: that he dies at forty-three; they have seen it. But how much do they not know? They do not know the age at which the man would have died had he known nothing of Anthroposophy. Perhaps, without Anthroposophy, he might have died at forty! If the span of a man’s life reaches to his fortieth year without Anthroposophy, it may very well extend to his forty-third with Anthroposophy. Inasmuch as Anthroposophy penetrates into life, its effects will also show themselves in life. 

Source: Rudolf Steiner – GA 112 – The Gospel of St. John – Lecture VII – Cassel, 30th June 1909

Translated by George Metaxa

George Metaxa

Previously posted on 28 November 2018

No one can be taught how to make people well, without at the same time learning how to make people ill

So one sees how the physical is a result of what preceded it spiritually and how in particular circumstances people have it in their power, through knowledge of certain relationships, to connect the physical with its spiritual origin. For example, if one knows how a particular illness is connected with particular feelings and emotions, he knows that by calling up these feelings he can also call up the illness. The black magician can make use of this knowledge to destroy the people. The deep occult truths can therefore not be taught to everyone without due consideration, for it would immediately bring about a sharp demarcation between good and evil. This is the danger inherent in the spreading of occult teachings, for no-one can be taught how to make people well, without at the same time learning how to make people ill. 

Source: Rudolf Steiner – GA 93a – THE FOUNDATIONS OF ESOTERICISM – Lecture XXIX – Berlin, 3rd November 1905

Drawing by Marcin Rutkowski