Hearing a global call
At this moment in time, a great number of women and men are expressing the urge to connect with a superior level of themselves. They are seeking contact with their inner innate reservoir of wisdom: their own Self, their Soul. This group of people is becoming aware of the existence in themselves of a transcendent reality and strives to contact and express this reality in life.
Such inner tension generates, for those who persist in their search, moments of soul contact, so that their lives become expressions of a dual energy, oscillating from the personal to the transpersonal (or spiritual) poles.
The existence of this dual polarity – the personality and the soul within human consciousness – helps us to understand the difference between two widely used terms today: voluntary work and service.
Voluntary work: good will in action
When we first hear a call to work for the common good, we usually start with volunteering. Voluntary work springs from the voluntary choice of the personal self to help with the problems of humanity through altruism and goodwill: this type of commitment is popular and it definitely represents an event of “conversion”. This is a good training for one’s personality, and a “preparatory practice” for future commitment in service, when the consciousness becomes oriented essentially towards the soul’s vision.
It is actually the soul that urges the personality towards inclusion and responsibility: voluntary work goes in this direction but since we are mainly focused on ourselves we are not aware that we are responding to a wider call; in fact a conscious contact with the soul is what differentiates voluntary work – as commonly intended – from service.
To achieve this conscious contact a transformation process is needed.
Building the bridge to our soul
The shift of our focus in life from personality to the soul is a period of fluctuation between those two parts and it can last for a lifetime and even longer.
At first we respond to the touch of the soul and feel the call to service but at the same time the personality claims its own rights, putting forward the various duties, desires and tasks it feels committed or drawn to.
In order to achieve a synthesis and activate a permanent inner contact with the soul some psychological work and training is necessary. In eastern philosophy this approach is defined as “building the bridge.” This building work connects the practical mind with the abstract / intuitive mind and activates a shift in the individual consciousness, progressively widening its boundaries, to include more and more beings in the field of attention and awareness; this expansion will lead to the experience of group consciousness, which is the way the soul expresses itself in life.
This preparatory training, which is essential and necessary, can appear committing at first. This is why a relatively small number of people are working with the spiritual technique of service. Still, through this process we can achieve a better contact with our true essence.
Contacting our soul, serving the Planet
Service can be described as conscious action as a soul. It is a direct call from our higher self to consciously participate in the great evolutionary project which is now taking place on the Planet. This project is bringing about a dramatic leap forward in the development of human consciousness, leading to the birth of a spiritually conscious humanity.
This is why service focuses on the tension to achieve contact with the soul, and not as much on the form that the service will take:
“May I beg those of you who respond to these ideas and are sensitive to soul impression (oft-times misinterpreting the truth, being biassed by personality ends) to lay the emphasis upon soul contact and not upon the form side of service. Activity of the form side lays stress upon personality ambition, veiling them with the glamour of service. If care over the essential of service—soul contact—is taken, then the service rendered will flow with spontaneity along the right lines and bear much fruit. Of this, the selfless service and the deep flow of spiritual life, which have been demonstrated in the world work of late, is a hopeful indication”. [Esoteric Psychology, Vol. II, p.126 © Lucis Trust Ltd.]
The contents of this article come from the book “Service”, which will be available soon in english.
The book is edited by Associazione Editrice Nuova Era.