WHO ARE YOU?
EXTRACTS FROM THE TEACHINGS OF SILVER BIRCH

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“Who are you? Do you know? You know just that facet that is expressed through your body, but that is only the pin point as distinct from the larger life which is beyond it.

When you say you would like to find out which is you and which is not you, you have to begin by discovering which is you altogether. Do you think that you have in this earthly life expressed anything but a tiny segment of your whole self? And do you think that the consciousness that is registered now is anything but a tiny fraction of the greater, complete consciousness that is you?

How are you to decide then which is your thought, your imagination, and which is the impression, the guidance which comes from your larger self or from higher realms that are using you?

You must get the proper perspective. You must realize that you are spiritual beings expressing yourselves through physical bodies and that the spirit is the supreme part of you. The spirit is the higher, the body is the lower. The spirit is the master, the body is the servant. The spirit is king, the body is the subject. The spirit is that part of you which is divine.

It is the self-same spirit which has created, devised and fashioned the whole universe. You have in embryo, in miniature, in microcosm, all the vast powers that belong to what you call God. If you would allow this innate divine strength to rise to the surface, to dominate your lives, you would banish every care, anxiety and worry, because you would know that there is nothing that could happen in your world over which you could not triumph. That is what you have to learn. It is not easy.

Give attention to your body as the house in which you live. But it is only the house, it is not you. Being the house, it must be kept in good condition, in good repair, so that the tenant can be amply looked after. But always remember it is only the house; it is not the tenant.

That same power which fashioned the universe is the power which is responsible for life. Life is not physical or material, life is spirit, and spirit is life. Wherever there is life there is spirit and where there is spirit there is life.

The power, which is you, is the power which is life and you have a kinship with the Great Spirit that enables you to participate in all the infinite processes of creation. You can call it up any time you so desire from the well of your own being - the tremendous power of the spirit that is resident within you, that is capable of giving you a dynamic, a vitality, and of sustaining you.

You have a task to perform. You will imbibe this knowledge and you will use it to help others. You will develop the gifts of the spirit yourself and when you have done so you will become a little lighthouse that sheds the beams of truth to weary souls still in the darkness. When you do that you will fulfill the purpose of your existence.

There is a plan into which we all fit and that will operate with the consent of your free will. There is a saying in the East that when the pupil is ready the master appears. When you are spiritually ready the door will open. You will not have to ask. The door will open so wide that you will walk through it and the task will begin.

We can never promise that your life will be free from problems, perplexity, or even pain. We can promise that within yourself you will find the means to overcome all handicaps and disabilities. As you strive to express the highest, the deepest, the greatest within yourself, so you will attract to your aid those beings from our world who love you, who desire to help you, and through you help others.

Alas, there are too many who live encompassed by swirling mists of darkness, whose shoulders groan under the weight of their load and who know not where to turn, sick in body, mind and soul. These are the ones we must always try to help.

We would be failing in our purpose if we were to declare that the task of spiritual attainment is easy and that those who, in any measure, would attempt to spread light where there is darkness will meet with an easy task. It could never be so. The whole of history is against it, for truth and error have been engaged in a dreadful warfare that will not cease until infinite perfection can be achieved and that, in the very nature of the case, is unattainable. It is a long and difficult and toilsome struggle in which we are engaged.

You do not realize the prejudice, opposition, hostility, antagonism, misrepresentation, superstition and deliberate attack that will have to be faced, I do not say these things to daunt you, but to place any quest in its proper setting. I know how difficult it is.

I have had to overcome, with all the power at my command, almost insuperable obstacles to reach your world, and I am not alone in this. I am one of those who elected to return because it was seen that the calamities which man would bring on himself were of so awesome a character that unless the power of the spirit could effect its bridgeheads everywhere, man would destroy himself physically and the world in which he lives.

Wonderful though man measures his material achievements, spiritually he is still very puny. Oh that the achievements of the spirit could match the achievements of matter, that progress could be made in fields of the mind and spirit that are comparable with the advance that has been made in certain fields of material endeavour!

Because man is not spiritually led he is in danger of blowing himself up with forces that he is not entitled to have at his command. All our efforts are directed, wherever channels can be found, towards the single purpose of ensuring that the spiritual truths upon which the whole of life are founded should be the basis by which man everywhere builds his life.

All jealousies and bickering, all strife and fratricide, all war and chaos, all envy, greed and malice can be driven from the earth. Compassion, kindness, gentleness, amity and co-operation can be the principles by which men rule everywhere because of the recognition of their common spiritual nature. There is a bright side. It is not a picture of unrelieved gloom, because amid such obstacles and difficulties any step forward is great progress. If you can help only one soul to be comforted when all seems drear, dark and dismal, then it has all been worth while. And you can help far more than one.

The prizes of the spirit are not easy to be won, otherwise they would not be worth winning. If the victor makes no effort, what is his victory? If you can scale peaks without labour, what have you attained? It is the very essence of the case that spiritual attainment must be a lonely, solitary path that gets more and more isolated the farther you reach because you have to leave familiar landmarks behind.

Emphasizing that wherever an effort is made by any human being on earth, at least an equal, and usually a greater effort is put forth from the Other Side, Silver Birch stressed:

It is always true that any sincere request for spiritual help can never fail. You open yourself to this aid the moment you make this magnetic link with the world of spirit. It is very hard sometimes to find language that will convey the actuality of spiritual happenings because language, which is material, is not equal to the spiritual, which is immaterial. Words, at the best, are poor symbols to interpret a much greater reality.

When you accept this knowledge it means your soul is ready; it has come into its own. So many people are unconscious of their higher nature, which is the reality and the mainspring of their existence. They do not understand that the reason they exist is because they are spiritual beings expressing themselves through material bodies.

Even though they believe they have a soul or a spirit, they think of themselves in terms of a body with a spirit, whereas they are spirits with bodies. The real you is the spirit - the soul, the divine, the eternal.
The body is fashioned to serve its purpose. It has a temporary existence in this form. When it has done its task, it crumbles away. But the spirit that incarnates at birth, that is important. The fact that you can receive this knowledge means that the divine has awakened within you. You have burst the bonds. The seed has begun to flower. It has forced its way up from the darkness into the light. And it will grow in beauty and richness as you allow it to do so.

Then you begin to exercise true harmony of being which is the fundamental purpose of life on earth. Those who go through your life without allowing the spiritual nature to have its complete and proper exercise are just as handicapped as the physically blind, deaf and mute.

Your spiritual nature has come into its own. The divine has been awakened. It is an index that points to the fact that you have reached that stage in your development when you are ready to obtain from life, not that which exists only on the surface, but all the richness that belongs only to the spirit. The riches of the spirit are far greater, far more beautiful, far more lustrous than all the gems of your world. They will endure long after the others have tarnished and rusted and decayed.

Once the soul comes into its own it realizes its powers. These are part of the mightiest forces in the universe. You begin to make a channel through which help, guidance, inspiration, sustenance and wisdom can reach you from our world. This not only enables the ones who love you and who are tied by blood to come close, but others, who are in no way physically related. They have a spiritual relationship which is even more important. These draw closer and seek to bring their power to bear and help you in your lives.

As this power obtains lodgment and builds itself up, so you become the possessor of that which the world can never give or take away, a rock based on confidence, calmness, resolution. Then you know beyond all doubt that there is nothing in the whole world that can disturb the realyou, and that you are at one with the power which fashioned the whole of life.

Men and women devote all their efforts to gain baubles and possessions far beyond what they need and sacrifice the eternal realities, which are the greatest assets the human being can have. Wherever you can, drop the seed. If you meet with rebuff, take no notice. Do not argue, do not attempt to become missionaries. You cannot force the seed to grow on barren soil. In the fullness of time some of these seeds will begin to take root. Those who have scoffed and ridiculed will come to you for help because they need it.

The tie that binds us together is the tie of divinity. It encircles us all and holds us in an embrace of divine love. Nothing can happen throughout the universe to weaken that affectionate embrace as long as we are true and loyal to that which has been revealed to us.

The Great Spirit will not fail us. We must not fail the Great Spirit. The whole of life pursues its course following ordained paths. The earth rotates on its axis, the tides ebb and flow, the stars and planets wheel across the sky following their charted course, the seasons come and go as part of the eternal cycle. The seeds grow and bloom and die, only to bloom again. Birds of diverse hues sing their cheerful notes, trees nod in the breeze, everywhere life obeys the law of which it is a part.

We cannot put ourselves outside that divine ambit; we are part of it. Let us remember, wherever we may be, that the cloak of infinite love is wrapped around us, the divine arms enfold us and we are always in the presence of that power that made us part of itself.