8/9/2019 Alcoholism, Esoteric Healing Part II p140

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First, on t he descending arc of alcoholism, there is diminishment of creative

thinking, an abnegation mentally of previous responsibilities, and a developing mental

isolation.

At emotional levels, there is increasing shallowness of affect, a loss of feeling forcultural meaning and family bonds. Energies which previously were directed into

many drives are now being focussed on one the satisfaction of the outward show of

thirst for what has been lost inwardly. There are swings of mood --highs and lows.

When the etheric level is reached even these energies are dispersed. The vitality is

diminished. Periods of complete exhaustion feature regularly. The subject is likened to

a creature stunned. Finally, physical degradation begins. The features bloat, redden and

hang and the face is "like a devil's, sick of sin."

Then, at the rock bottom of degradation, all alcoholics agree about the occurrence of

one supreme common experience . - that of an overwhelming and nameless fear thatbesets them. The fear is so intense, so groundless that some have described it as a

"fear of fear." And only when this trough is reached, in which the most hellish

experiences occur, with or without delirium tremens, that the process of the

descending arc can reverse itself and the hard upward struggle toward rehabilitation

begin.

If therapists could understand the nature of this fear and its causes the whole method

of treating the alcoholic could be revolutionised and given a better chance of success.

The suicide rate of alcoholics is extremely high and the astral world has a high

percentage of its population made up of discarnate alcoholics. Their numbers areexcessive because unlike other discarnate groups, their worldly desires are, in most

instances unrequited. Suicide, accidental death and death from some acute

condition, like an overwhelming infection, does not bring an end to the desire

nature far from it! The earthly desires, after a short period of quiescence, reassert

themselves in the astral body after death and the urge for drink, or to return to

gluttony or to sexual excesses surface once more into the consciousness of the

recently dead.

These effects were spectacularly described by the clairvoyant C. W. Leadbeater, who

on many occasions personally witnessed the crowding of astral entities, previously

alcoholics around bars, taverns and inns where alcohol was being consumed. It was asif something of the fumes, if not the actual liquid could be drawn into their astral

bodies at these sites.

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