1926_02_21 The expressive face

[Viktoriya]

Беседата на български

 

Translated by Victoria Koleva

 

 

 

THE EXPRESSIVE FACE

 

Year 5, Lecture 15 of the Youth Occult Class (Special Class)

Given by the Master Beinsa Douno

On February 21, 1926, Sunday

 19.00h, Sofia - Izgrev

 

 

 

Always be faithful, true, pure and kind!

 

Contemplation

 

An essay on the topic: “Ten important questions” was read.

 

The disciples’ essays on the topic: “What am I thinking of now?” and on the freely chosen topic were read.

 

 

 

 

 

Figure 1 represents two trapeziums – one facing up and one which has been turned upside down. In the organic world each line – be it straight or curvy - has its meaning. The upper trapezium represents the head of a Chinese person. Chinese people’s foreheads have the shape of a trapezium. They have a highly developed objective mind. The upper curve represents the forehead of a European, a person belonging to the white race. When the upper base of a trapezium starts to get enlarged and grow upwards, this shows that the organism’s internal conditions are improving. When conditions improve, one gains more power to counteract hardships. The more the cheekbones in a given face stick out and the cheeks sink in, the weaker that person’s digestive system is. When the digestive system is weak, one falls easily into pessimistic moods. This is due to the fact that digestion doesn’t work properly. If the food doesn’t get digested well, the blood can’t get purified properly either. Then semi-organic deposits gather in the organism in the area of the joints. These anomalies in the organism lead to indisposition and one starts thinking the wrong way. In order not to fall into pessimistic moods, you need to use your willpower to improve your digestive system. Observe yourself in the mirror and work with your thought until you bring the muscles of your face to their proper condition. The facial muscles need to be flexible and to express the smallest changes in one’s internal life. If a person’s face doesn’t express the life of his soul, it is similar to a mask. This is an abnormal expression of the face. An expressive face can be calm externally, but at the same time express the person’s internal life. One needs to keep his consciousness awake each and every moment and to control the muscles of his face so they don’t get loose. All muscles have been created by intelligent powers. If one facial muscle only has atrophied, the person already deprives himself of the activity of one intelligent force in his organism. All muscles, nerves and arteries have been created by intelligent beings. Any disturbance or interruption in the functioning of these muscles, nerves and arteries leads to disharmony in life. Harmony in life is based on the proper functioning of each cell and each organ in the human organism.

 

Now that you know this, don’t try to negate the significance of small things in life. Each thing that Mindful Nature has created is in its proper place and can’t be rejected. There are things we can do without, but there are also those we cannot do without. For example, one shouldn’t have a double chin or a weak stomach and the muscles of his face shouldn’t be sunken. Nature doesn’t like skeletons. It dresses even stones with moss and lichen. Therefore, whatever you are lacking you should try to acquire. Whatever Nature has endowed you with, you should try to keep. One of the tasks of the disciple is to work on his face, to make it expressive. The expressive face has features that never change. However, all muscles around these features are in constant movement. A face that everyone can read represents a well-written book. A gentleman went to a famous phrenologist and asked him to tell him something. The phrenologist touched his head in a few places and said: “I am sorry, sir, but I am unable to tell you anything.” – “Why?” – “The text on your head has very small fonts, it’s unreadable.”

 

The human face and head represent books which Nature has written in with beautiful intelligible handwriting. When a person looks at somebody’s face or head, he should be able to read something that brings him joy, so that after reading it he can say: “I read a page from a great book and I am very pleased.” Rejoice when your face changes and when the muscles express the internal changes that happen in you. Each change in the face is an expression of life. The face is an expression of the human soul. A beautiful, expressive face gives an impulse for work, science, art, poetry, etc. A beautiful face excludes all pessimism. A person’s face can get distorted by suffering but only temporarily. When a person realizes that suffering comes for his own good, he gradually improves his face and brings it to the level of beauty he strives for. The narrower the lower part of the trapezium gets, the more agile the mind becomes. If the trapezium turns into a cone (Fig.2), it loses its balance. It can’t balance on its tip, on one point only. In order to sustain its balance this cone needs to move very fast, i.e. to be in constant movement. As soon as it stops moving, it falls on the ground and turns upside down. When it loses its balance it loses its power as well.

 

 

So a face with the shape of a cone which is in position A, with its tip pointing down, shows a person with a good, agile mind. When the face comes into position B which is a cone with its tip pointing upwards, this shows an animalistic state. This cone represents nothing other than an animal with horns and hoops. If you want to write a letter to a friend and tell him that you are working and thinking well, you can express this symbolically with a cone whose tip points down. If you want to write to him that you aren’t doing mental work, that your mind is stagnant, you can draw a cone with its tip pointing upwards. Your friend will understand that you have fallen into an animalistic state. Such letters represent the language of Nature which people will use in the future. If contemporary people understood the symbols that Nature uses, they would be able to make detailed predictions based on the earth’s layers, the way they have been folded and layered, and they would be able to understand what kind of forces have worked on these layers – internal or external. The earth’s layers are letters from the earth’s distant past which scientists read and translate. In that sense real scientists are clairvoyants. By concentrating their mind on a given object they get to those absolute truths which an ordinary mind cannot penetrate.

 

Work consciously on your face to make it more beautiful and expressive than what it is today. The smallest achievement in this task will be a reward for your labour, your efforts. This will become a gain that a person will carry with him. Only such gains are real. Any other gain that a person can’t take with him is temporary, unreal. Only what the Spirit and the soul carry with them is real. Can we achieve this? – You can achieve anything you like but not in one go. When you get some free time, work on your face. If temptations come and attack you from the inside or outside, give them some work to do – let them solve the problem with the cones. When you put them to work, they will gradually calm down until they disappear completely. There is a Bulgarian saying which goes like this: “Ask a lazy person to do some work and he will give you a good piece of advice.” I am saying: “Give some work to the devil so he doesn’t tempt you and disturb you.” An Englishman had two goats and a donkey. The goats spent their days in the mountain and came back home in the evenings where the monkey sat waiting to play with them. The moment it saw them, it started cleaning their fur from the thistles that got stuck in it. When it couldn’t find thistles on their fur, it started jumping on their backs, pulling them by their beards and ears in order to play with them. The goats screamed, pulled back but the monkey continued playing. Finally the master had to come and free the goats from the playful monkey. This is what the devil does to humans. When he can’t find thistles on their skin and there is nothing to clean, he jumps on their backs and starts pulling them and tormenting them. The reason devils torment people is that they have no work, nothing to busy themselves with. People have a twisted perception of the devil. He isn’t good but he isn’t as bad as they imagine him to be either. Because he has no work, he comes up with a thousand things to tempt people with and make them commit sins.

 

Now, in order to free yourselves from temptations, from the negative influences in life, alongside your ordinary tasks you need to create special tasks for yourself, to strive towards some high ideal. Whatever conditions you may find yourself in, do not despair. Work on the realization of your internal goals. Each of you should buy a small mirror to look at yourself often, especially when you are indisposed. If you are indisposed, look at yourself once or twice and see how many minutes it will take you to change your face. When you look at yourself, examine the distinguishing characteristics of dissatisfaction, anger, jealousy, etc. Note down the changes that happen to your eyes, the colour of your face and lips, etc. Sometimes the face becomes pale, other times – red; sometimes the eyes grow dim, the look becomes gloomy, the lips get pale. Each change in the face is an expression of something. Sometime the face becomes long and the cheeks sink in. Why? – There are a number of reasons for this which need to be examined. Each living creature is subject to change. One needs to study these changes, to exercise his brain and keep it in constant movement. If you want to change your face and make it more expressive, you need to ask your brain for help. If you want to know what kind of changes have happened and continue happening in your brain, look at your face. You should study your face the way an astronomer studies the skies.

 

I wish that each of you would be able to create a new type out of himself. Bulgarians need to transform their faces and make them beautiful, expressive, so they can become a model for the new human, the new type. An agile mind creates a flexible, agile face on which ideas leave their mark as if it were sensitive glass. The human face should be able to speak. It should be the master of the house. As the master of the house the face will take care of its well being and fix the smallest damages or disturbances in due time. The beauty that a person carries inside him should be expressed in his head, face, arms, legs, his whole body, and finally in his speech, which manifests in his thoughts, feelings and actions. Next come his soul and his Spirit as final expressions of the human beauty and greatness. When I speak of human beauty, I have not only the external but also the internal beauty in mind.

 

Make it your goal to give a specific expression to your face. When you look at each other, you should see in the other person an image of compassion, mindfulness, nobility, erudition. Each of you should start building up some virtue in him which should be expressed in his face. Work hard with your thought in this direction and see what you can achieve. Do this experiment for seven days. Take 10-15 minutes each morning or evening to contemplate on the image you would like to create. Seven days times 15 minutes makes 105 minutes. It is interesting to see what you can achieve in that time. If you want to acquire the expression of a compassionate person, you need to think intensely on compassion. Imagine that you are visiting the home of a poor widow with a few small children. The mother runs around and works all day to earn money for her children’s daily bread. When you imagine the difficult situation that this widow is in, trace the feelings that awaken in you. Then look in the mirror to see the expression of your face. Afterwards imagine that you want to help this widow. You put your hand in your pocket but you find nothing there. You borrow some money and buy bread, cheese, tea, sugar, and you take all this to the poor widow. Observe yourself internally to see what joy and satisfaction you will feel. Look at yourself in the mirror again to see if joy has appeared in your face. After doing this experiment mentally, do it in real life as well. This is the only way to develop compassion. Therefore, as disciples you need to work with your thought, in order to develop all these feelings and abilities which can endow your face with expressiveness and beauty.

Always be faithful, true, pure and kind!