by Bruce Johnson
Bruce Johnson has over 30 years of study in the fields of Ancient Wisdom and occultism. He has taught classes on a wide range of topics, from Atlantis to mediums to Zoroaster. He is also a Spiritualist minister, with a background in spiritual astrology. He lives in Colorado with his wife and their cat.
Recognizing the fact that human beings are dual in nature is fundamental to the understanding of one’s true self. These two aspects are known as the soul or individuality, and the mortal self, esoterically referred to as the personality. The researcher will discover that different authors use the words soul and spirit to represent various spiritual levels of consciousness. This writer supports the teaching that the soul or individuality is the highest aspect of an separate human being, with the spirit corresponding to a vehicle or instrument of the soul.
Each human soul, in its triple nature, lives immortally on its own plane while developing and evolving over the ages. Individuality nature is- humanity and group focused, completely aligned with good, spiritually oriented, intelligently loving, selfless, intuitively and higher mind based, and permanently linked to one of the seven primary color rays. To unfold its full divinity through experience on the lower planes of life, every soul cyclically sends forth a small portion of itself to physically incarnate. This incarnated fragment of the individuality is the lower self, or personality. Our souls remember every aspect of their many human lifetimes.
Personality qualities include- self-centeredness, moral duality, a materialistic world focus, selfish desire, limitation, accenting the lower mind and personality ray, and living a transitory physical existence followed inevitability by death. During incarnation, the personality is often unaware that it is only a portion of the individuality, and not a separate entity unto itself. The spiritual goal is to develop a soul-infused personality through its merging with the individuality. To understand and become our immortal selves, we need to discard old limiting and inaccurate identification habits. We often identify our “self” with either our physical body or our lower human self. Accurate self- identification requires identification with the soul individuality.
The harmonious relationship between the individuality and the personality is of vital importance. There is a very real flow of energy between the soul and personality at all times. The strength of this connection and the stream of power through it varies greatly corresponding to spiritual development, and the aids or obstacles to the soul in being able to influence its personality. Right use of the mind, selflessness, assisting human progress and evolution, combined with aligning our human goals with our soul’s purposes, all fortify the connection between our higher and lower selves. The Strength Tarot card depicts the solar angel, or individuality, spiritually dominating and directing the lower animal self, symbolized by the lion.
The sutratma, sometimes called the “silver cord”, that is attached to the soul and anchored in the heart, brings life-energy and coherence to every part of the physical body via the bloodstream. The difference between sleep and death is that while astral projecting during sleep, the spirit is always linked to the body via the sutratma so that a current of life continually flows into the physical body. At death the sutratma is permanently severed, making it impossible for the person to return to their physical vehicle. Without this principle of unifying life streaming into and through it, the physical body quickly disintegrates.
The violet ray is the color ray par excellence for unifying the individuality and personality. Its qualities include the ability to synthesize the part with the whole, and to integrate and fuse opposite polarities.