Something very significant happens during this phase:

A fundamental transformation is being prepared.

We increasingly recognize our actual state and develop the desire to free ourselves from it.

In meditation, we notice that we’ve lost our awareness in thoughts and then return to the perception of reality. This moment of awakening is of great importance - it generates a spiritual power that forms the foundation for everything that follows on the mystical path.

The repeated practice of this small step - recognizing and returning to reality - develops a crucial ability that leads to sustained mindfulness of awareness.

Ultimately, this brings us to enlightenment - or, in other words, to the awareness of God’s presence in every moment - a state in which we can live filled with True Love.

Through meditation, we slowly become aware of the different states: 

on the one hand, the captivity and strong identification with our thoughts and emotions; on the other, the phases of conscious awareness.

The moment we wake up again, we often feel as if we have slept or wasted the time before. But gradually, the motivation to stay awake longer grows.

In order to change our state, we must first become painfully aware of our current reality.

This is part of the inner path. Step by step, it leads us to ever-deeper self-knowledge.

The positive transformation during this phase usually becomes more noticeable in daily life than in meditation itself.

We become clearer and more aware. We begin to consciously recognize our different states of consciousness.

Our psychological state gradually improves: we experience fewer negative emotions overall and are less easily emotionally triggered.

Negative states are processed and resolved more quickly.

Moments of Clarity

When I prepare my breakfast in the kitchen after meditation, I often feel very clear - I consciously enjoy every perception and experience every action with full presence. This is very pleasant and valuable. 

You will increasingly experience such moments throughout the day. 

Perhaps even a brief feeling of joy when, for example, you see a bird or look at the sky.

We can also become more aware in our interactions with other people.

Even if such experiences are still rare, they show us that we are on the right path. 

We should therefore value and appreciate them.

In this phase, our spiritual sensitivity begins to unfold gradually.

In order to become aware of God’s presence, we need a kind of spiritual perception.

God is pure spirit and cannot be perceived directly through our physical senses. Instead, we become aware of His presence through our spiritual senses.

Spiritual sensitivity opens the door to our own spirit and to the realm of spirit. We begin to sense the atmosphere of a person or a room. We also become aware that we ourselves are spirit or soul, and that our spirit lives within a spiritual environment.

We begin to recognize the emotions behind our thoughts

During meditation, we first become aware of our thoughts.

As we go deeper, we also sense the emotions underlying the thoughts. We realize that recurring thoughts are often driven by deeper emotional patterns.

This is already a significant step toward inner depth.

At the same time, this can be a helpful exercise: As thoughts arise, we can ask ourselves what atmosphere they have.

We can try to feel the mood they spread. In this way, we begin to perceive the underlying emotions and their energy.

Later on, we also become aware of the spiritual atmosphere.

We experience ourselves within a spiritual environment and recognize the influence it has on our feelings. Through longer meditation and prayer, this environment gradually changes - it becomes freer, lighter, brighter, and more loving.

Spiritual sensitivity is something different from spiritual openness - and this distinction is of great importance.

While spiritual openness can be dangerous, spiritual sensitivity is healing.

Experiences with spiritual openness

When I read my first book about the spiritual world in my youth, I wanted to experience it for myself.

It had always been important to me to personally encounter things rather than just read about stories or theories. So, I decided on an experiment:

In the evening, I would sit for several hours in a dark room and try to perceive the spiritual world. I spoke to the spirits and asked them to show themselves to me. After doing this for a few weeks, strange things began to happen:

As I was falling asleep, I suddenly couldn’t move my body – an experience of sleep paralysis. I tried to scream, but it was impossible. Only after a few seconds did I regain control

Sometimes I heard a voice saying: "Now I am here." Even during the day, I often felt strange, unpleasant sensations in our apartment – so intense that I sometimes had to leave. 

My mother then suggested we visit a medium.

The lady asked us who in the spirit world we felt connected to - someone who could help me. My great-grandfather was a person we both loved and appreciated. After she called him, my mother and I simultaneously felt an overwhelming presence.

It was like sensing the atmosphere of a person - only intensified immensely. The entire room was filled with his presence.

This experience made two things absolutely clear to me:

• The spiritual world definitely exists.
• Becoming spiritually open is not a good goal - in fact, it can be very dangerous.

After some time, these phenomena faded away. I then discovered Zen meditation, which grounded me deeply. Pure mindfulness meditation leads in exactly the opposite direction: it first anchors us in the physical body.

The spiritual sensitivity that gradually develops on this path grows from the solid foundation of an improved unity of spirit and body.

This is healthy, stabilizing, and ultimately leads us to the true goal – to resonate with God's love.

I had already received a first inkling of this in the experience I previously described with self-remembering - a moment of awakening into aliveness and bliss.

In the phase of deepening, moments of enlightenments can already occur. In Zen Buddhism, these are called kenshō in Japanese. Christian mystics refer to spiritual insights of this kind as illuminations.

These insights have a different quality than purely intellectual realizations that arise arise from understanding content and connections.

They surpass intellectual understanding by far in their clarity.

Spiritual truth cannot be grasped by the intellect alone. It is revealed through spiritual illumination by God – this is the Christian understanding, and it also corresponds to my personal experience.

These illuminations are a sudden awareness of a spiritual reality. 

They often happen during meditation, but they can also occur in everyday situations. Such experiences touch us deeply at the core of our being – sometimes to the point of tears or emotional overwhelm.

For example, during my morning exercises – which for me are also a mindfulness practice - I had a kenshō experience.

In a clarity I had never known before, I became aware that I am not the thinker within me. I am something entirely different - what Buddhism refers to as the true self. In ordinary consciousness, we are completely identified with our thinking, feeling, and willing.

I have known this for 30 years - but I had never experienced the expansion of consciousness with such intensity.

I will share more about this kind of illumination and similar experiences later on.

Below, we examine various approaches to dealing with negative feelings and stressful experiences.

The Conditioned Approach

Let’s take a simplified look at how we usually deal with negative emotions and unpleasant sensations:

We are conditioned to try to get rid of them as quickly as possible.

When we feel tension, we massage or move the affected muscles to release it. We react in a similar way to unpleasant emotions - often trying to improve them by talking or thinking about them.

One common strategy is distraction: we turn to other activities, hoping the negative feelings won’t return.

Another frequent pattern is compensation: we attempt to mask unpleasant inner experiences through external actions or achievements - such as excessive performance orientation, perfectionism, or the pursuit of recognition. While these compensatory behaviors may provide a temporary sense of control or worth, they cannot truly substitute for addressing the underlying need.

However, if there is a deeper psychodynamic cause behind the feelings, they will keep reappearing.

Healing Through Processing the Original Experience

In my therapeutic work as a systemic therapist, it has become increasingly clear to me that change occurs less through reflection and thinking, but more through perception. 

Pure perception of inner processes leaves no room for illusions.

The more a client is able to consciously perceive their internal processes, attitudes, feelings, and connections, the less the therapist has to intervene. One’s own reality reveals itself through perception - and nothing gives a more powerful impulse for change than the clear recognition of reality.

In psychotherapy, there are various methods to support this process.

A classical approach involves guiding the client internally to the original experience – the point at which the problem first arose. For example, consistent perception of feelings can trigger an internal search process.

By asking "Where do I know this feeling from?" or "When did I first feel it in my life?" we consciously come into contact with the original experience.

Once this connection becomes conscious and the emotional bond is established, we can process the experience. This is called regressive processing.

Consistent Mindfulness and Acceptance in Meditation

The first step in meditation is similar to the approach in regressive processing: We become consciously aware of the feeling and its energy and stop thinking about it.

Pure Perception Instead of Thinking

Through meditation, we learn not to be guided by our usual conditioning. 

The first conditioning we must overcome is automatic thinking. 

As soon as we experience something that triggers a negative emotion, we unconsciously begin to analyze the situation mentally. We try to resolve the feeling through inner dialogue and reflection - but this often works only to a limited extent and prevents us from going deeper.

Who hasn’t experienced lying awake at night, unable to sleep because of incessant thinking about an unpleasant situation? In such moments, it’s especially difficult to let go of thoughts.

In meditation, the meditation object - for example, the perception of the breath - helps us anchor our consciousness in present reality. By focusing on a physical sensation, we withdraw from mental conditioning. 

We don’t let our awareness be taken over by reflective thinking or analytical problem-solving, but remain with the immediate experience of the present moment. This allows us to consciously feel and remain in the emotion as a pure physical sensation – whether as a physiological reaction or an energetic presence.

This allows us to experience the feeling as a pure bodily sensation – whether it’s a physical reaction or an energetic movement – and remain present in that sensation

Overcoming the Defense Against Unpleasant Feelings

The next conditioning we must dissolve is our instinctive defense against everything unpleasant. 

We are used to wanting to get rid of unpleasant feelings as quickly as possible.

Through meditation, we learn to accept negative sensations and feelings as they are. As I explained in the previous chapter, consistent mindfulness in the present moment is the first step toward consciously experiencing the presence of God.

We do not try to change reality and do not allow ourselves to become distracted. Instead, we remain with our feelings and give them conscious attention. 

To me, this is the true meaning of self-love: to perceive oneself consciously without being controlled by negative feelings.

When we learn to turn inward and open ourselves in meditation, many contents from our subconscious initially begin to surface.

This is both beneficial and inevitable. From a psychological perspective, it is a process of integration. If we remain mindful, we can allow this process to unfold - without active interference.

Mindfulness exerts its most powerful positive effect here.

We will notice that images of situations and the associated emotions rise to the surface. After a while, a sense of calm returns. Each time, it is a liberating experience.

Through this process, our mind begins to purify itself and prepare for the journey into greater depth.

Meditation does not mean suppressing or "meditating away" negative feelings.

If we feel that we are suppressing emotions through meditation, we are not in the correct state. 

Pure mindfulness is free from any effort of will - it is neither directed for nor against anything. Such a sensation shows us that we have not yet fully internalized the practice of acceptance.

If we do not experience the phenomenon of contents rising from the subconscious, it may indicate that we are concentrating too intensely. 

In this case, it would be time to loosen the concentration a bit.

Healing through God's Grace

Ultimate healing takes place through being filled with the love of God.

In this mystical experience, we undergo a renewal that gradually becomes our natural state of being. Through love, everything in our mind and soul can be healed.

A separate section will be dedicated to receiving God’s grace, so for now, I will leave it at this brief note.

I had returned to practicing Zen meditation and traditional Christian prayers for some time. But I longed for a more direct experience of God. Deep down, I was already in a crisis of faith and felt desperate inside. I wanted to make a new attempt to enter into deeper prayer.

So I changed the way I practiced Zen meditation. What began as pure mindfulness meditation turned into a contemplation of God's presence. With every breath, I became aware that God is present in this very moment. I used a kind of mantra with the phrase:

"God is here now." 

I practiced this prayer daily for about 90 minutes.

I had read and learned so much about God, but I wanted to free myself from all those concepts and encounter God as He truly is. I no longer wanted to confine Him to a box of thoughts and ideas.

I said to Him, “Even if you are not a good and loving God - I still want to experience you as you truly are.”

Over time, a feeling developed in this form of prayer that is difficult to put into words. It was as if I were sitting alone in a pitch-black, cold hall on a concrete floor. I felt empty and lonely. This feeling grew stronger over the following weeks and months.

The hall seemed to grow larger, the floor colder, the surroundings darker.

I pleaded silently with God for a sign - but nothing came. No light, no spark, no sound, no feeling.

Only complete silence, deepest darkness, and absolute emptiness.

Eventually, the hall expanded so vastly that it seemed to encompass the entire universe. I was alone in this infinite darkness.

No sign of God.

I asked myself why God couldn’t at least give me a small sign, since I was so desperately begging Him. During that time, I wrestled with Him. Sometimes, I even doubted His existence.

Then God led me to a group that practiced the Prayer of the Heart - which was, in essence, exactly what I had already been doing for half a year. There, someone recommended a book in which I read a passage about the seemingly silent God. 

It was a great relief to learn that other contemplative Christians had gone through similar experiences.

Some time later, I came to understand what God was trying to show me through this darkness.

God is within me

Even though I was deeply immersed in prayer, I had still been looking for God outside of myself. I wanted a perceptible sign from Him. I had often read in the teachings of Sun Myung Moon that God dwells in the innermost heart - but I hadn’t truly internalized this in my meditation.

It’s possible to meditate without truly turning inward.

Only when I began to consciously learn this, a kind of heart meditation developed. The feeling of abandonment disappeared. Instead, a quiet, silent joy settled in my heart.

Later, I also realized that I wanted to perceive God through my senses. 

But Buddha teaches that even our perceptions are empty. And Sun Myung Moon says that not even in the spirit world can God be directly perceived - for He is pure spirit, without form.

How one can still become aware of God's presence, I will describe later.

A street is considered clean if there’s no trash lying around. But if all the dust from that street were in our bathroom, we would find it very dirty. Even after thoroughly cleaning the bathroom, a bit of dust always remains.

Yet if the remaining dust from a clean bathroom were in our eye, it would be extremely unpleasant - and we would want to remove it immediately.

In the same way, the spiritual life involves a growing standard of purity. When we practice silent prayer, we move closer to God.

In the presence of God, even the smallest speck of dust becomes visible.

Someone might claim they do not sin because they don’t steal and remain faithful to their partner. But in meditation, they may come to see that through their actions – or inactions – they still cause harm to others and to God. This realization challenges their self-image.

Ultimately, we hurt our own heart whenever we hurt others or God.

Our original heart is very pure. The more we wound it, the further we move away from our center and from our true self. Later, we begin to feel more clearly the pain that our lack of love has caused in our heart.

I found myself in a phase where, admittedly, I was somewhat depressed. I wasn’t feeling well internally.

It was winter, I had been overworking for a long time, and I was exhausted. The external situation couldn’t be changed in the short term, and there was no sign that it would improve anytime soon. In such life phases, I tend to slip into depression, as I’m naturally prone to it.

In my meditation, negative thoughts about other people constantly surfaced. Over time, it became increasingly clear to me what was going on inside of me: 

I felt bad and tried to feel better by internally devaluing and criticizing others.

Gradually, memories of situations from my past emerged - moments where I had done the very same thing.

The image I saw of myself filled my entire inner world. It felt as if I had spent my whole life doing nothing but putting others down in order to elevate myself.

In psychotherapy, the focus at this point might have been on rebuilding self-esteem. But on my path of prayer, something else became clear to me: I painfully became aware of this inner pattern.

I was horrified - even disgusted - by my own behavior. I was utterly fed up with myself.

I had already been through many years of psychotherapy, until psychologists told me that nothing more could be done - I would simply have to live with it. On top of that, I had nearly 40 years of walking a religious path behind me, and still I was the same.

I lost hope of being able to improve myself in this life. With all my supposed wisdom as an experienced family therapist, I had not succeeded in healing and changing deeply enough. 

I lost hope that I could ever truly change in this lifetime. Despite all my supposed wisdom as an experienced family therapist, I had not managed to heal or transform myself deeply enough. 

It felt like I was being worn down from the inside.

But it was precisely at that point that something significant happened. The greatest blessing of my inner life opened up to me:

I became willing to place myself completely in God's hands.

I asked God to change me - and that was the moment I began to experience the miracle of His working in me.

It’s not easy to entrust oneself to God - to let Him guide my life and align my decisions with His will.

But even harder for me was to entrust the transformation of my inner being to Him.

The concept of repentance often had a bitter aftertaste for me. At times, it felt like belittling or devaluing oneself.

I wondered why God would need our repentance if He loves us unconditionally.

I don’t expect my own children to repent when they’ve hurt me. It’s enough for me if they open their hearts again. Then I can open mine as well, and all is well - the love can flow again.

The way God revealed this inner step to me was truly surprising. 

I’ll describe it through one experience.

It was during a time when, in prayer, situations repeatedly came up in which I had acted without love. I had always thought of myself as a loving person. But these situations showed me a different image of myself. Over time, they worked on me.

I began to allow them in and accepted this new view of myself.

This was followed by a deep, sad mood that lasted for several days.

Repentance is the most powerful step toward receiving God’s grace. God does not need our repentance in order to forgive us, nor does He want to belittle us.

His only motivation is to bless us richly. 

Whether we deserve it or not is irrelevant - God’s love knows no bounds.

In the experience described earlier, it became clear that God wanted to grant me His grace.

He wanted to place His love into my heart.

But I was not yet open and ready for it. 

I believed I was a loving person because I often tried to be loving and not hurt others.

However, an inner preparation was needed in order to receive this grace. It came through reflecting on my own lack of love in many situations. 

Then came the decisive step: I had to accept what God was showing me.

Yes, it’s true - I am often unloving!

Only by accepting this did the sadness over my lack of love arise - the feeling of repentance.

Repentance is a completely natural feeling that arises when we realize we have done something wrong. Once we allow it to reach our heart - and that is the most important condition - our heart becomes sorrowful.

This sadness of an open, sincere heart is repentance. 

And it is precisely this kind of heart that God needs in order to give us His grace.

The steps are as follows:

1. Allow painful self-realization
2. Accept the reality that is shown
3. Allow the feeling of repentance
4. Receive the grace

In the end, one could say that it is a reason to rejoice when something leads us to repentance. It is a sign that a great gift is waiting for us. 

It only takes a small step on our part to receive it.

According to Christian belief, an event known as the Fall of Man caused a fundamental problem at the beginning of human history. Since then, human beings have no longer existed in natural, immediate closeness to God. The path humanity must take to return to God is referred to as restoration.

On this path, the principle of reparation - also known as atonement or indemnity - comes into play. 

It states that in order to return to God, a person must offer something in sacrifice. In the Old Testament, material things such as animals were sacrificed. In ascetic practice, this is done, for example, through fasting. On the inner path, the sacrifice often takes the form of a process that is accompanied by a period of suffering.

God’s grace is an indescribable, real power that we can connect with through the spiritual path.

It is a resource that does not exist in psychotherapy. In fact, it is grace that truly makes the way to God possible in the first place. How difficult would it be if we had to bring about all change by ourselves?

In psychotherapy, the focus is on becoming aware of behavioral and emotional patterns in order to develop new ones.

This is laborious detailed work. In a truth- or ethics-centered religious life, we also reflect on ourselves and strive to improve. 

All of this is valuable, and we should make use of these tools.

But it is God’s grace that ultimately leads us to our true human potential.

As children of God, we are not left to ourselves

- we become the object of His grace. 

Our essential task is to open ourselves to it. The mystical path leads us directly into the experience of divine grace.

The sincere heart that seeks God

The most important thing in religious life is a sincere heart that longs for God – because this very longing is love for God. 

This heart is what leads us back to Him. 

Through prayer, we can reconnect with it. It is exactly this heart that drives mystics to walk their path. We are called to rediscover this love within us and open our hearts to it.

In reflecting on the dissolution of the ego, we touch upon profound spiritual questions that I would like to explore in this excursus. To that end, I will present various perspectives from different religions on the themes of the immortality of the soul, reincarnation, and karma.

On the one hand, I want to look beyond the horizon; on the other hand, I want to show the origins of beliefs.

Many spiritual seekers are drawn to commercial offerings, where often old wisdom is merely repackaged and attractively presented. Many do not bother to engage with the original sources of the great religions.

I have my doubts whether one can truly be led to God along such a path. For the unpopular aspects of the spiritual journey - such as humility, repentance, and reparation - are usually left out in such offerings. 

Yet there is no way to reach God that bypasses them.

There is also the danger of getting lost in an endless array of new spiritual trends and losing sight of the true core of the path.

True spirituality cannot be consumed — in fact, it demands the opposite: to turn inward, embracing humility, simplicity, and silence.

The primary goal on a genuine spiritual path is not merely to feel good in the short term, but to find God. This sometimes requires us to let go of and sacrifice beloved things. 

Here, a clear distinction in orientation becomes evident.

We should continually ask ourselves what we are truly seeking, so that we may recognize and, if necessary, correct our orientation.

At the same time, I do not wish to judge those whose first steps are through modern spiritual offerings. Every path begins somewhere - and sometimes, even a superficial entry point eventually leads to greater depth.

What matters is that we keep asking ourselves whether we are drawing closer to the truth, whether our hearts are being transformed, and whether we are truly willing to walk the uncomfortable parts of the path.

Ultimately, we must come to a point where we are led by God Himself within our innermost being. No offering, no teacher, and no master can replace this.

However, this requires a real inner transformation.

In the Christian context, the process of dissolving ego-identification is often described as self-denial. 

However, it usually does not become clear that there is a level within us that we do not need to deny.

In religion, the development into a more selfless person plays a central role. It describes the fundamental direction that true spiritual growth must take.

To carry out this process within ourselves, we must distinguish between self-centeredness and selflessness.

In practice, however, this often proves to be difficult.

The Challenge of Distinguishing Selflessness from Self-Centeredness

Change in the Process of Development

An infant can only focus on its own needs. One could say that human beings are born in a state of maximal egoism. 

However, we expect that as people grow, they will increasingly consider and work for the common good.

For this reason, we should always consider age when making judgments.

With children and adolescents, we usually do this quite naturally.

But when it comes to adults, we rarely differentiate between a thirty-year-old and a fifty-year-old - even though with healthy development, one should actually be more selfless at fifty than at thirty.

Selfless behavior does not necessarily mean being selfless

Many social activities still satisfy our own needs: we seek positive feedback, recognition, appreciation, want to avoid loneliness, or wish to be part of a community.

Being socially engaged, therefore, does not necessarily mean one is selfless.

That’s why we must always reflect on and question our motivation..

The problematic effects of this distinction in certain psychodynamics

There is one exception where trying to become more selfless is not helpful.

Some people take on too much responsibility too early during the socialization process within their family - like when a child begins to emotionally care for a parent out of fear that the family might fall apart.

This can lead to an unhealthy orientation toward others. In such cases, we become highly attuned to what others need, while losing touch with ourselves.

But this is not healthy altruism – it remains part of the ego.

This must not be confused.

People with such a psychodynamic pattern must first learn to feel themselves and reconnect with their own inner being before they can truly find God.

In these cases, the conscious effort to become more selfless would only reinforce the existing psychological structure, rather than foster true spiritual growth.

According to the Divine Principle, the original mind also cares for itself to some extent

The Divine Principle also makes it clear that the purpose of the whole fundamentally includes the purpose of the individual.

To a certain degree, the focus on self-preservation and vitality is part of our original nature.

Even here, the goal of the religious path is to become a selfless being. The original mind is revived and liberated from the fallen nature, so that it becomes the primary motivation of our existence.

Conclusion

When we look more closely, it becomes clear: the categorization into egoism and selflessness can easily lead to misunderstandings.

These categories invite premature judgments and can lead to poor decisions in our inner process.

Especially in the delicate process of self-knowledge, they often distort the view, block access to a deeper examination and thus hinder genuine self-knowledge.

This categorization serves merely as a rough orientation. 

It is indisputable that true spiritual growth brings about selfless individuals.

But not every perspective can reliably guide us through this inner process.

A perspective that supports the path to selflessness

On my own spiritual path, the search for my selfless true self helped me more than any external evaluation of my behavior.

At our core, we are selfless beings. This innermost essence simply needs to be awakened and freed from the superficially self-centered ego.

This path leads us through an inner process of searching, in which we recognize and gradually let go of our ego-identification.

The result is a natural transformation towards selflessness – through the liberation of our selfless innermost being.

In what follows, I would like to describe more precisely the perspective that helped me on my path - and the inner transformation that came with it.

In my inner journey, the following perspective has been especially helpful to me because it clearly distinguishes the different levels of our being.

We are the true self and have an ego. 

The ego arises from being attached to our personal, individual thinking, feeling, and willing - as well as to our personal desires and needs.

This construct of "self" and "I" is so strong that it is difficult for us to detach from it. 

Yet it is precisely this letting go or expanding of our consciousness that is necessary in order to recognize and liberate our original nature.

It is necessary to open ourselves to God.

In mysticism, we approach this phenomenon on a deeper level.

We realize that the problem lies in the fact that we initially completely identify with our personal thinking, feeling, and willing - yet this only constitutes the surface layer of our being.

Through mystical practice, this identification gradually dissolves. This process unfolds step by step through meditation and mindfulness.

In meditation, we observe thoughts and feelings without letting our consciousness be consumed by them. Our consciousness expands into the area of our being that lies beyond thinking, feeling, and willing. 

An interesting question arises: What are we if we are not our personal thoughts and feelings?

What remains of us when thinking, feeling, and willing reach the zero point?

This question leads us to our true self.

As long as we are still identified with this individualistic self, we cannot truly recognize God within us.

The ego wants to be seen, respected, and appreciated, and to be especially important to others. It strives for its achievements to be recognized and admired for all eternity.

The ego is vain. 

It feels hurt when we are not seen or taken seriously. It becomes jealous and offended when it is ignored and forgotten while others are rewarded. It gets triggered when it feels devalued by someone — even if it wasn’t intended that way.

It always wants to win. When it loses, it becomes deflated and frustrated. The ego is afraid of losing and is greedy for always getting more.

How proud it is of its own opinion, even though it can only take a limited perspective! 

It constantly compares itself with others, trying to elevate itself and feel better by devaluing others. 

It seeks praise and recognition from others, striving for it with all its might, while losing sight of the true purpose.

The process of dissolving ego-identification can be illustrated for me with the following metaphor:

Imagine two trees standing close to each other. One tree symbolizes the ego, the other our true self. A person wanting to move from one tree to the other without touching the ground represents our consciousness.

It would be extremely difficult to move from the ego tree to the true-self tree by letting go of both hands at once. But it becomes possible once we have grasped a branch of the true-self tree. Then - with a bit of courage - we can fully release our grip from the ego tree and swing over with both hands to the side of the true self.

The most critical phase of this transformation is the transition where we must let go of the ego without yet having a firm hold on the true self.

This requires faith and trust in the mystical path. 

Thus, once we have caught a first glimpse of inner joy and peace - figuratively speaking, once we have grasped a new branch with one hand - it becomes possible to completely let go of the ego.

Identifying with the true self does not mean that the ego disappears. Rather, it means that we experience ourselves as the true self and can then educate the ego from that higher perspective.

Our two selves: the true self and the ego

One perspective that has been very helpful to me in this process is the distinction between two levels when using the word "I" — the ego and the true self.

When we speak of "I," we should be aware of which level of being we are referring to — the ego or our true self.

In meditation, thoughts sometimes arise that we consider extremely valuable. We definitely don't want to let them go - they seem so brilliant to us. 

But if we are honest: do we still remember what we thought an hour ago or yesterday?

Most of it is forgotten — and thank God for that!

I have experienced hundreds of times in prayer that, in a relatively deep state, I would start to formulate teachings in my mind. Often, good inspirations for lectures would emerge from this.

In the past, I would always get stuck there, sometimes even writing down the thoughts. 

But then I dared to let them go and opened myself a little more deeply to God.

In those moments, I had my deepest prayer experiences. 

They opened up a level within me that went even deeper. These experiences later became the true foundation for better lectures.

I have never lost anything by letting go of thoughts and ideas.

What is truly important always comes back. Today, when my inner teacher becomes active, I rejoice - and let it go without worry.

Through the experiences in meditation, we recognize how strongly we cling to our thoughts. 

In the moment when we entrust ourselves to God's presence in prayer and let go of our thoughts, we release a part of the ego.

This is a crucial practice on the spiritual path.

Each time, it is a small step toward the zero-point state -

the state in which we can fully open ourselves to God.

After the level of thoughts follows the level of emotions.

Just as we are identified with our thoughts, we are also identified with our emotions. We experience them as if we are our emotions. Letting go of this identification is the next, deeper step.

Our natural tendency is to constantly seek to feel good - this is how our body and brain are conditioned.

Our original mind also enjoys feeling good, but not at any cost. 

It places love above everything else.

In human life, it is impossible to feel good permanently. Like the weather, our circumstances - and thus our emotional states - constantly change. Although we know this, we tend to make our feelings the measure of all things. 

Many of our actions are aimed at feeling better. While this never works permanently, we still cling to this idea.

If we were able to let it go, we would probably feel good more often.

Buddha taught that two of the five main hindrances on the path to enlightenment are aversion and craving.

• Aversion means the rejection of anything unpleasant. We want to free ourselves from negative states in life and harbor resistance against discomfort.
• On the other hand, there is the desire for something we want to get. This leads to greed. When we have something, the fear of losing it arises. So we try to hold on to it.

The ego is driven by aversion and desire:

 "I like this, I don’t like that."

Its entire life revolves around this axis. The goal of this game is to constantly feel good.

But life and reality care little about our ego.

Pleasant things come and go, unpleasant things come and go - and we cannot fundamentally change that. Life means change; it encompasses joy and pain, gain and loss.

By rejecting the unpleasant and trying to cling to the pleasant, we create additional suffering.

Equanimity is a state of mind that frees us from being controlled by external conditions. Equanimity means that we are unaffected by how we feel or by the circumstances around us.

We do not change our mindset because circumstances change. 

Equanimity in a game would mean that we don't care whether we win or lose. They are just two sides of an experience. One loses and another wins. 

This does not mean that we are indifferent. 

We invest everything to win. However, we fully accept reality even if we have lost.

By doing so, we experience the reality of losing as it is, without constructing unnecessary drama around it.

We cannot influence the weather. It is simply part of the conditions of life. Sometimes the sun shines, sometimes it rains. No matter how much we might hate winter or love summer, there will not be one hour more or less of either because of our feelings.

The weather, like reality itself, remains completely unimpressed by our desires.

Humility, gratitude, and generosity are significant qualities of the original mind. 

They open us to God and create the conditions necessary to receive God's grace.

The original mind does not need the characteristics of the ego. Behaviors such as comparing oneself with others do not exist here. 

The heart simply desires to give love and to devote itself to living for the sake of others. It is grateful for everything it receives and is deeply aware that all of life is a gift.

All goodness comes from God

Emanuel Swedenborg reports on his conversations with angels - where he understands "angels" to mean spiritual beings, which also include human souls. 

They are very amazed by the people on Earth - especially that they are proud of themselves and attribute their good qualities and achievements to themselves.

For the angels, it is self-evident that all goodness comes from God, including their own good qualities and abilities. Therefore, they wish to thank and praise God for every good thing that happens and for every achievement.

Therefore, they wish to thank and praise God for every good thing that happens and for every achievement.

This attitude reflects the nature of the original mind very well.

True humility is only possible when we have found some access to our true being. If we were still identified with the ego and wanted to educate it, we would have to constantly belittle our entire being.

However, once we have found access to the inner joy that comes from connection with God, we can continually bring the ego down from its high horse - without feeling bad about ourselves.

The deep appreciation we experience when we realize that God truly desires to dwell within us fills us profoundly.

We are then no longer dependent on satisfying the ego.

From true humility springs great strength. It enables us to be placed fully in the service of God.

A message through Martin Luther's life journey

A generous friend gave me a book about Martin Luther (Martin Luther, the German Reformer, from 1856). It conveys his spirit in a very direct way.

Reading this book became an intense and moving encounter with Martin Luther for me.

In a prayer, I received the following message:

If God takes you, then let yourself be taken - and great things will happen. Despite your imperfection, let yourself be taken and trust in God.

The courage to entrust ourselves to God arises from humility. Courage is the other side of the coin of humility - and it is already embedded in its word. Martin Luther lived this truth.

It was a phase in life where I worked a lot. We had bought a nearly 100-year-old house in need of renovation. Our vision was to create a home, and at the same time, a place for inner and spiritual development. After the purchase, there was no money left, so we had no choice but to do everything ourselves.

For seven years, I did almost nothing but work and pray. 

After work, I would immediately put on my work clothes and work until I was exhausted – usually until 10 PM. We replaced almost everything except for the bricks and beams.

After a few years, I felt under pressure. I was already in my late 50s and desperately wanted to do something for God. But the workload was so enormous that everything seemed to drag on endlessly.

Over and over, I asked God what I could do for Him in this situation.

Then He gave me a message.

I had a dream with unusually clear images. In the dream, I was applying for a job at a company. It was still unclear which position I would get. I was shown various tasks – office work or technical duties. But none of them particularly excited me.

In a longer silent prayer, something suddenly happened. 

I had an insight - not just an intellectual realization, but a small enlightenment. 

It came over me as if from nowhere. 

Initially, it was without content, a pure spiritual experience that came from a depth one begins to sense in nothingness. A moment later, it became a clear sentence:

"I am not an employer! I just want to be present through you!”

This message overwhelmed me emotionally. Even today, I get tears in my eyes when I think about it. It completely changed my perspective.

God did not want someone to work for Him - yet that was the relationship I had lived with Him. I had treated Him like an employer for whom I could work to earn His reward. I believed I could satisfy Him if I accomplished enough.

But God shook me awake from this limited concept. That was not the relationship He wanted with me.

God wants to live within us. God wants to manifest Himself through us.

This insight changed my feeling toward God. 

No longer was the pressure to accomplish something in order to make God happy the focus. Instead, my focus became preparing myself and opening up so that God could dwell in me.

If God wants to be present through me, then He can be at any moment – whether I'm knocking plaster off the walls, sitting on the toilet, going for a walk, or talking to someone.

It is not the external action that matters, but my consciousness and my love for God in every moment.

What I can do for God no longer comes from my reasoning and planning, but unfolds in my heart in every moment of my life.

Every moment becomes an expression of being and acting in the sense of God.

When we embark on the path to God through the search for truth and a specific image of God, we often form an idea of Him. Our relationship with God then takes shape according to this image.

However, on the mystical path, we seek a direct experience with God through prayer - and there were several surprises for me along the way.

At the beginning of our prayer life, we turn to God, much like speaking with another person. We have a counterpart to whom we express ourselves and expect a response.

But have you ever thought about how it is possible to be one with God while also relating to another person?

We cannot pray to God and speak with someone at the same time – that would divide our attention. That would be unbearable.

However, the relationship with God is completely different from that with a person.

God does not manifest as a conversational partner in the conventional sense, but as a new feeling in our hearts. 

One might call it resonance - a deep inner vibration in which we feel God within us. We do not communicate with God through thoughts or words, but experience Him directly through this inner feeling.

In this way, we are able to give a person our full attention without losing the closeness and connection to God for even a second.

When a person loves us, they can be there for us, hug us, listen to us attentively, give us something, support and defend us.

Compared to the love that God wants to give us, that is still very little. God goes one significant step further. 

He wants to dwell within us. 

He wants to become one with you personally with the most precious thing He has - His heart.

It is the greatest appreciation imaginable, the greatest attention possible, the greatest devotion conceivable, and the greatest gift that exists in this universe.

He wants to offer everything to us.

In an important mystical speech where Sun Myung Moon explains the zero-point standard, he also speaks about revelations. He gives some examples of how they are conveyed.

On a January 1st, I had a dream of Sun Myung Moon. It was very vivid and real, and I felt very close to him. He was sitting cross-legged on the floor, and I sat across from him in the same posture. Then I took his hand and looked at it closely.

I said to him: "A good hand." He replied: "Good hand – good heart." Then he took my hand and said: "Also a good hand." 

And with that, the dream was over.

It was 3 a.m., and I couldn't sleep anymore. So I got dressed and went for a walk in the park. There, I saw a rabbit - and then another one. Somehow it felt special. It's not unusual to see rabbits at night, but more and more appeared, until eventually there were five.

Five rabbits! 

Suddenly, a shiver ran through me, and I recognized the parallel:

A hand has five fingers – and now these five rabbits. 

Additionally, the number 5 represents a human being – four limbs and the head. I immediately remembered that Sun Myung Moon once said that rabbits are a good sign of promise.

An internally very challenging year followed. 

The year that followed was very challenging inwardly.

Yet during that time, I kept seeing a rabbit – and each time, shortly afterward, something good happened in connection with my mystical work.

For example, the first unexpected contacts developed. I was able to move people in conversations who then organized the first workshop. Also, before the first trial workshop with my family, I again saw a rabbit. Throughout the year, these related phenomena occurred.

These events were always related to the new mystical approach and the intention to pass on my experiences.

Before the workshop, I strangely had the recurring thought that I must not die before the workshop. This event was of great importance for my mission. I strongly felt that I had to pass on the experiences and the message that God had given me to the next generation. 

The question arose within me: Would I be willing to die for this?

I told myself: If I die after the workshop, it's not so bad - but not before. Somehow, the theme of dying or not dying before this workshop became an intense inner struggle.

When I finally conducted the first workshop, I suddenly experienced cold sweats and chest pains during the following night – a sensation I had never felt before.
I feared it might be a heart attack, and my son drove me to the hospital. I was examined throughout the night, but it turned out that my heart was completely fine. Relieved, I walked home at 5 a.m.

Thanks to some videos we had recorded during the trial workshop, I was able to take a short break and still complete the workshop fully.

The following night, I again had intense dreams and was wide awake at 3 a.m. Then I felt an inner call from Sun Myung Moon to go outside. 

So I went for another walk, but this time I felt strongly that I should take a different path.

On this path, I then found €50. 

I was surprised and immediately thought again of the number five. I interpreted it as a sign that the five promises had been fulfilled with this workshop.

These experiences show how events, dreams, and enlightenments interact and become messages.

God can guide and teach us through such means.

In the past, I often had doubts and made sure not to overvalue such events. But through my more intense prayer life, my spiritual sensitivity has further opened. 

Additionally, there was the aspect of enlightenment, which has enormous intensity – so much so that I can no longer deny the connections.