What do I do to myself?   Challenges are not adversaries; they are like  a newly found continent we ought to explore and conquer

We begin this study with the quote of the evangelist Matthew 5:25: "Settle matters quickly with your adversary." Therefore, we ask who our adversaries are. The boss, the neighbour, the mechanic, the cook, the leader... and so it goes, through a variety of people and circumstances which, on a daily basis, rub shoulders with us along the way and which can disturb our peace. We know that we do not have the right or the possibility to change whosoever it is. We are all, as Fritjof Capra says, "... on the screen of life, interacting with each other, individually and interdependently at the same time.” In this dance of events, we should not blame anyone for the thorns on our side. The thorns are, above all, appropriate fellows to our moments. We know that, in the "Web of Life" we are simultaneously doing and undoing it. We should dismissing evil emotional complex that emerges from our unconscious and disturbs the conscious forcing it, in many cases, towards unwanted behaviours and situations. At the same time, we are building our future, starting from other postures, connecting us to intellectual and moral progress in accordance with what Kardec advises us when he says: "The true Spiritist can be recognised by the efforts they employ in order to dominate their bad instincts."

Now, if I cannot blame the other for my own misery and if I must dominate my bad instincts, thus, I must settle matters with myself, arguably, my biggest adversary. For such I need to get to know myself better, from my mental constitution and my innate files which I worship or bother me. We come from a gigantic past from where we slowly move ahead, in a slow, progressive and spectacular pace. We slept in the mineral, as Denis Leon said. The question 540 of "The Spirits' Book" mentions that: "...It is thus that everything in nature is linked together, from the primitive atom to the archangel, who himself began at the atom." Virtuously, we would make us cohesive and ready to live with consciousness. We move, then, to the animal kingdom, from the earliest moments in the oceans to the grand march through the mountains, valleys and other realms that have enabled us to the awakening, when we come to the man. One can imagine the range of files we have built over this period from a primordial archetype. 

Guilt is always a breakdown of consciousness 

Andre Luiz, in the book Evolution in Two Worlds, tells us at the end of the third chapter that after analysing the travel time taken by the divine monad through the previous kingdoms that the human being, automated in their impulses through the pilgrimage to the angelic kingdom, "in order to reach the age of reason and acquire the title of man endowed of reasoning and discernment, spent nothing less than a billion and a half years to reach the beginning of the Quaternary period when the stone age civilization reveals some basic technical masterpiece". Now, as a man, we are building ourselves to reach holiness - the natural way. Thus and long with the spiritist notes that refer us to the Gospel of Jesus, we need to slow down so as to examine ourselves in regards to what we have achieved in the good and what we still need in order to ensure that our experiences are useful in terms of ethical and moral advancements with religious consequences. Ideal religion professed within each of us in a direct relationship with the Father

We often find, in personal researches, the guilt and fear complexes. According to Joanna de Angelis, inherent in her book "Conflitos Existenciais (Existential Conflicts)", in chapter six: "Guilt is the result of anger that one feels against one's self, turned inward, in the form of feeling that something was done wrong." Still the same benefactor mentor and in the same book, in chapter three, says: "Anger is a feeling that expresses itself every time the ego feels hurt, releasing this abominable adversary that destroys peace within the individual." Taking advantage of the opportunity, we quote André Luiz that noted in the book Entre a Terra e o Céu (Between Earth and Heaven) - Ch. 23: "Guilt is always a breakdown of consciousness, and through that dark forces creep.”

Anger, guilt and ego: we know that the ego represents a set of ideas, wishes and thoughts that move the person and develop its own perspective in the face of its own life. Ego leads to self-acceptance and admiration. This is according to the current information in various compendia mainly on Analytical Psychology. Joanna de Angelis reports that the ego is "responsible for the differentiation that the individual is able to achieve between his own internal processes and reality." Therefore, the blame for some unfortunate behaviour will generate anger and greatly affect the ego, causing reactions in the individual field of relations with himself or with others. In contrast, and by excellence, there is the prospect of awakening the Self, that is: the God in you, the inner Self.  

To err is human; to persist in error is childish 

Continuing our analysis, it is not difficult to conclude that the fears generated by guilt and anger may turn us into violent and aggressive beings, both physically and verbally, motivated by insecurities. Insecurities make us and those around unguarded. We, then, begin to live an incomplete life, always trapped in and observing others' reactions about us, defending ourselves from visible and invisible opponents, people or circumstances.Hence, personae (masks) loom in which we hide ourselves afraid to face the adversaries created and not always real that arise, as we do not fight them. It is known that we are charged according to our possibilities. To err is human; to persist in error is childish.

While learning, experimenting, improving, the Spirit will adjust itself to live within the natural laws established by God. When we start to repeat the mistakes within the lessons already learned and consolidated in our cognitive, we start to blame ourselves for those actions. Some examples of that are the disbalances of sexuality, addictions from the ingestion of hallucinogenic drugs, alcohol, tobacco, too much food, unfortunate fallacies, judgments of others and a multitude of actions inconsistent with the spiritual man who needs to awaken the Self inside himself.

People and situations that constrain ourselves as well as those who wish us well often manipulate us. At this point, we need to reconsider the harmful effects of all this unfortunate psychological involvement that bring us annoyances, which hamper our healthy and efficient motion. Hence, the question of confrontations arises.

It is very interesting as we read in the book "Triunfo Pessoal (Personal Triumph)" by the aforementioned benefactor, in chapter five: "Psychological maturity induces human beings to successive confrontations of its process of individuation." According to Jung "Individuation is a process by which human beings evolve from an infantile state of identification to a state of greater differentiation which implies an expansion of consciousness." It is important when we place ourselves as observers of our process of liberation from old ideas and attitudes, transforming them into propellers in motion, self-aspiring us in order to better lead us in the process of evolution.

It is advisable that we improved the character, sublimating feelings

Before, we used to be reborn, grow up, work and die on successive occasions, without the exact knowledge that those events provided us. Therefore, we walked, laughed, worked on something, exalted our personae and delighted with their paved formations and consolidations. Individuation, however, was out of context or, at best, carried out slowly not always consciously. Now, with the openings that "The Spirits' Book" has offered us, we can observe that the dynamics of life requires a conscious participation. In question 23 of that book, we are told, "The spirit is theintelligent principle of the universe." When we think of the universe, something superior comes up in our minds and then we wonder: what is the universe, what is the use of it in our lives? Why are the Eastern monks so much fond of it? Moreover, a vast field of research unfolds within our process of growth for individuation.

In order to appreciate of that we are offered in the form of new challenges, it is advisable that we face up all of our moral imperfections; that we improve the character, sublimating feelings. "The confrontations are battlefields in which the being grows and develops the invaluable resources asleep in the Self, which are waiting to offer the contribution of the peace of Nirvana" - Joanna de Angelis's notes in the book "Personal Triumph."We sometimes see people motionless in the face of their guilt. The fear of facing them makes time pass and makes them remain in the unfortunate states into which they forced. They spend their lives deceiving themselves, wandering around themselves, seeking here and there the next satisfactory moment that will make them laugh and have fun with their laughter.  Then, return to the state of almost, if not complete, depression by immersing the senses in the dark valley of the mental caves. Behold them, therefore, fearful. According to Victor Hugo, in the book Párias em Redenção (Redeeming Outcasts): "Fear is the merciless executioner of those who fall into its hands. It produces special vibrations that tunes up with other bands in the same size wave, allowing the unfortunate exchange of depressing, congestive forces. "Hence, many the times the person attacks to defend himself or flees not to fight. We know that the spirit endless, as stated in question 83 of "The Spirits' Book." Will we live infinitely in this reckoning of insecurities? It would be considered an overthrow of the Divine Plan that has created us to live with God in eternal glory of the Light.

Fear is not a good journey companion

If not done yet, it is time we faced the adversaries who are not outside but inside each one of us. It is time to reconcile with them, as Jesus advises us. The fear is not a good journey companion. Caution, instead, is. Therefore, we must prepare ourselves to face with style and common sense our faults, fears and insecurities. According to Joanna de Angelis "It takes a deep attachment to the Self which will acquire greater awareness of the vital relationships with its core in the psyche." It is prudent to ponder our companies, those to which we smilingly open the doors of our homes or happily visit theirs, exchanging gifts and information, toasting at convulsive parties to this or that. To them we are also opening the doors of our hearts and minds, filing facts that will produce reactions. It is recommended that we preserve our homes!

We recall that we once knew one person who claimed to exist in his hometown a boy who spoke with God in the intimacy of his bedroom. Everyone laughed at that statement. One day we stopped to think about the validity of that story. Now, if God is within us, if His kingdom is the seed sown that requires watering as told us by Jesus in the Parable of the Sower, then we can, within our spiritual particularities, keep a conversation with the Father. He will answer us according to our understandings and thus we will be linking to the Self that will tell us how best to proceed in order to become winners in our struggles against the vices and in settling the virtues; silencing so they can give us advice.

"The religious content is of vital importance in psychotherapy of confrontation. Know the Truth and it will set you free. Fight the primitive passions, turning lower impulses into emotions of harmony. Do not flee or hide from the others increasing the bitterness against society and against yourself.“In addition to these wise guidelines, Joanna de Angelis also informs us: "As the ego becomes aware of the values ​​inherent in the Self, a healthy programme for the behaviour becomes feasible by working every difficulty, every challenge, through the reconciliation with one's eternal reality."

Now we can ask ourselves: What do I do to myself? Do I lash myself against the adversaries or turn them into continents that I ought to explore and conquer? It is good that we love and respect each other. That we become one with Creation, as we are all integral parts of a whole made of light, therefore we are light. It is good that we confront our limits wisely and extending them with pleasure, being victorious and thus virtuous. There is no point in carrying the world on your shoulders but walk on it eyes fixed on to the heaven of our higher consciousness.