factor of the spiritual self, or of the soul (the will), then enables the individual to cooperate with that spirit, that truth, that fact which has ever been set before man—“If ye will be my son, I will be thy God—If ye call, I will hear—Behold, I stand at the door and knock; I will enter, if ye ask.”
Then, these are not mere sayings! They are facts, truths, life itself! but the individual is not made aware of same through the material things nor material-mindedness; rather through spiritual-mindedness, as to purposes and activities of the soul in its lessons, its tenets that it has carried through its expressions in the earth.
EC 1797–3
Body, mind, and soul are commonly understood to be parts of our being and are comparable to Living Being, Soul Mind, and Soul Being. Let’s now move beyond these and consider two portions of our being that are not common: Spirit Mind and Spirit Being. These are significant concepts in Kabbalah and Cayce.
Spirit Mind (Chayah)
Our Spirit Mind—Chayah (the “living one”)—is beyond anything earthly. It relates to the first flash of consciousness and the Giver of the gift of consciousness. Here is our spiritual mind, the womb of individual creativity, from which we use our very own free will to conceive. This level of our being can give life, can return life after illness or even death, and can “quicken” us, as is often said of the Spirit.
This is the glassblower. This is our divine consciousness. The glassblower’s breath (Soul Being), its expressed breath (Soul Mind), and its encased breath (Living Being) journey out to experience the universe and the freedom of individual life.
This Spirit Mind maintains contact with the perfection of the Creator and the Creator’s consciousness. It is the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow.
We can lift up lower portions of ourselves (soul mind and soul being) into this portion, but Spirit Mind does not normally descend to our level. And when it does, it is profoundly overwhelming to our soul mind and barely perceivable by our conscious mind.
Though it rarely descends, we can lift up our soul and Soul Mind to it. Once the connection is made, we gain access to and help from the powerful Spirit Mind. But it is important to remember that the Spirit Mind has nothing earthly or worldly in it. Soul Mind is the savior, understanding the weaknesses of the Living Being. Spirit Mind is absolute truth with no room for vagaries.
When in the Spirit Mind, we would not perceive activity as we do in a dream of the Soul Mind. In the Spirit Mind, the imagery is more like a vision. It would be images like those the prophets described when seeing heavenly things, wondrous features, and dynamic energies.
Cayce identifies this level of consciousness as the “superconscious,” as does Hinduism. Here’s an example:
Q: Explain and illustrate the difference in the faculties of Mind, Subconscious and Superconscious.
A: The superconscious mind being that of the spiritual entity, and in action only when the subconscious is become the conscious mind [meaning deep sleep, deep meditation, or death]. The subconscious being the superconscious of the physical entity, partaking then of the soul forces and of the material plane.”
EC 900–31
Notice that our subconscious mind is as the superconsciousness to our outer, conscious mind. But when the outer, conscious mind is subdued or absorbed into the higher mind, the subconscious becomes the active consciousness and the superconscious is as the subconscious is to us today in our present condition.
This may seem unnecessarily confusing, but it is really helpful when one is attempting to make passage through dimensions of consciousness. For example, when meditating, we must still the conscious mind and personality and all the concerns of the earthly portion of our being. As we do this, our soul mind and soul being become our natural condition of beingness—we are a soul. If we stay with the meditation, then we may move even deeper by subduing our soul self and awakening to our spirit mind, which is connected to God’s mind. Now we are entering the deepest levels of meditation. This process also occurs in deepest sleep when visions rather than dreams come.
When asked to illustrate this level of consciousness, Cayce gave two examples. The first is the biblical scene in which Saul is on the road to Damascus, is suddenly surrounded by a brilliant light, and hears a voice speaking to him from the light. (Acts 9) In this instance, Cayce says that Jesus’ superconscious mind was attempting to communicate with Saul’s subconscious and, to a degree, his conscious mind. But the presence of such a high level of consciousness overwhelmed Saul, who fell to the ground and struggled to comprehend the experience and capture the message in the voice. His traveling companions could not comprehend the experience, only seeing the light but not hearing the voice.
The second example is in Revelation 19, when John, deep into his ecstasy, sees an angel in heaven. The angel gives him information, after which John falls down to worship the angel, believing it to be God’s projection. The angel balks at this, saying, “You must not do that! I am your fellow servant and your brother . . . Worship God.” (Revelation 19:10) Cayce explains that, when Peter and John were arrested, Peter was to be executed and John exiled to the Isle of Patmos. As they parted, Peter told John that he would endeavor to come to him after his death. Cayce says that this angel was Peter in the higher, superconscious quality of being, and as such, he appeared to John as an angelic expression of the Lord (remember, a portion of us was made in the image of God). The angelic aspect of his former colleague and brother in the cause corrects his mistake and directs him to the God of all the godlings.
Spirit Being (Yechidah)
Our highest level of being is Spirit Being—Yechidah (meaning the “single one”). Here is the ultimate unity of the individual in God, as an individual spirit within and one with the Great Spirit. The Spirit Being is the highest of the five levels of being. It is the one made in the image of God. (Genesis 1:26) Here we also find that the superconscious mind is one with the Universal Consciousness of the Creator.
Cayce viewed the spirit entity as a thing apart from anything earthly. Here’s one example:
Q: Does the spirit entity have a separate consciousness apart from the physical, and is it as the consciousness of [Mr. 900] when he dreams, or has visions, while asleep?
A: The spirit entity is a thing apart from any earthly connection in sleep, yet connected. For the earthly or material consciousness is ever tempered with material conditions . . . [the spirit entity] partakes of the spiritual forces principally. In consciousness we find only projections of subconscious and superconscious, which conditions project themselves in dreams, visions, unless entered into the superconscious forces. In the consciousness of earthly or material forces there enters all the attributes of the physical, fleshly body. In the subconscious there enters the attributes of soul forces, and of the conscious forces. In the superconscious there enters the subconscious forces, and spiritual discernment and development.
EC 900–16
We have three basic levels of mind: physical consciousness, soul subconsciousness, and spirit superconsciousness. The physical is far from the spiritual, but the soul bridges this gap, connecting all of our parts—from the highest to the lowest and back again. There are also three distinct qualities of being: our outer projected self, our inner soul self, and our infinite spiritual self.
Levels of Being and the Chakras
