Will You Have Self-Control, or Will 'Self' Control You?

Have you noticed that most things seem to be out of your control? You can’t control the weather or the passage of time. You have little—if any—influence over what people say or do. Nevertheless, there are things you do seem to have control over, such as your body, your actions and what you say. But even this ability is limited: you can’t control your urge to sneeze or decide when you get hungry, tired or thirsty. Most of your bodily functions are run by the autonomic nervous system, which regulates homeostasis without any conscious attention on your part. So, my question to you is this: while science suggests that consciousness comes from our brain, and you feel like you are self-existent, are you really running the show? 

This question can be answered in simple terms: God is in control. He always is and He always will be. The control we experience is just an appearance. 

Now, I don’t know about you, but I don’t mind the idea of having the Lord in control, especially when I still get to perceive life as my own. It seems like a great deal! I work with my externals, and He works with my internals. Nevertheless, I still struggle. I feel like I’m on my own and the pressure of the world is bearing down on me. What if I’m taking the wrong approach? How do I know if I’m choosing truth over falsity? What if I’m keeping the Lord from accessing my internals? 

The problem with this thinking is that we cannot perceive interiors form our exteriors (AC 1594). As long as we are in the confines of our body in the external world, we have no idea what’s actually going on inside us. Our emotions and desires might give us hints, but we are never going to know for certain. The good news: uncertainty is a result of having freedom, and freedom allows us to choose ‘truth’ for ourselves. In this way, our only point of control is the choice between two realities: trusting your senses or trusting something other than your senses. 

It is a hard choice to make; it is human nature not to trust anything out of our control and the world of our senses—our external experience—is amazingly persuasive. It really does feel like we’re alive! It is hard to deny our experience when we are constantly immersed in it, and yet, we are taught that there is something more, that we must look beyond ourselves to an invisible world that we have no perception of, ruled by a God that we cannot see. But this doesn’t change our experience. We still feel and perceive life as our own. This perception is called the proprium and it is where our battle against evil begins. 

What makes you ‘you’: Keeping the enemy close.

Trying to figure out what makes you ‘you’ is a complex task. In the simplest terms, a human must be able to want, think and act. The ‘want’ part is our love and love, which is in our will, drives us because it is our life (DP 78). Our sense of who we are—our proprium—is part of our life, for we need a proprium to receive freedom and we need to be free to choose (DP 78). 

The exact relationship of the proprium and will isn’t entirely clear. In Conjugial Love, two propriums are described, one of our will and one of our understanding (194). Elsewhere we see the will is referred to as “part of a man’s proprium” (AC 1047) and in some cases, the proprium is described as the will itself (NJHD 82, TCR 273). What we can draw from these passages is that the will and the proprium are interrelated, however, whether the will is entirely the proprium or is simply a part of the proprium still remains ambiguous. 

The proprium is vital to us because, without it, no union to the Lord can occur (AC 252). Do not be fooled though: while our proprium can be the tool for conjunction, it also contains our worst enemy.

Unfortunately, within our proprium is all our inherited evil, making the proprium our doorway to the hells (HH 558). Because we feel autonomous, we can easily convince ourselves that love comes from us—from our proprium—instead of from the Lord, because that is how it feels. If we buy into this appearance, it becomes easy to side with our senses because all external evidence confirms this illusion of control. But just like your proprium, it is only an appearance and your body is only a tool to exercise freedom and rationality in the physical universe (NJHD 148).

Despite the appearance to the contrary, all life comes from the Lord. He has the real proprium: the heavenly proprium (NJHD 82). Anything we do, any sense of life that we perceive, is actually the Lord working on our behalf. He leads us with our proprium (AC 2678). The Lord stays hidden during this process so we don’t reject his guidance because we would rebel if we saw him at work in our lives (DP 186). The process of regeneration is about re-ordering the evil in our proprium so that eventually it may be replaced with the Lord’s heavenly proprium, and once the heavenly proprium exists inside us, conjunction can occur. No person can be reformed without freedom provided by a sense of self (AC 1947). 

So, you are not actually in control, as all the tools for reformation, the power to reform and even the ability to experience the reformation comes from the Lord. Wait…what part of you is actually ‘you’ then? Well…not really any of it is you. And yet, here you are.

Making your proprium work for you

We get it. We know that we can’t trust our proprium to desire good stuff. So, what should we do with it? How can we use our proprium if we can’t trust it? How do we exercise the self-control that we don’t actually have?  It’s all about compulsion, specifically self-compulsion. 

The reason self-compulsion works is because we have an internal mind, which is designed to lead, and external mind, which is designed to be led. Being compelled is where one mind leads the other and we can be compelled either by our internals or our externals. Compulsion from our internals, however, is the only kind of compulsion that truly has a lasting effect on our lives. These two levels of our mind are designed to work together, nevertheless, they are distinct and can work separately in an unregenerate person (DP 145). If we are compelled to do something for external reasons, such as fearing punishment or pain, the changes we make aren’t permanent because externals cannot compel internals, for any good in the internal mind resists compulsion and turns away (DP 136). This occurs because influx from the Divine flows from the internals to the externals and not the other way around (AC 6322).

Self-compulsion (rather than just compulsion) is where the internal brings the external into alignment. It isn’t an easy task though. The process begins when a person identifies evil and decides to desist from that evil considering it a sin, for if we truly think something is wrong, we should stop doing it (DP 145). Since you want to rid the evil from yourself (even though you really want the evil), the Lord is able to approach your inner thought, remove evils and falsities and implant the seeds of good there (DP 145). Unfortunately, the external cannot be changed at the same time, so it still desires evil and resists the internals, causing a battle between the internal and the external. This process is called a Temptation (DP 145).

The battle for control

Temptations, while difficult, are not bad. The Lord desires nothing more than for us to be close to Him (AC 1799.2), so when He draws near, the evil and falsity in us becomes excited and fights back (AC 7568). While it sounds counter-intuitive, this process of temptation, where externals are forced into submission, is not contrary to freedom and is the difference between self-compulsion and compulsion (AC1947). In fact, we are in a greater state of freedom during a temptation, even though it feels otherwise (AC 1947). This is because we are always kept in an equilibrium between heaven and hell (LJ 33) and in a temptation, hell is closer to us. The Lord is also closer to us to counter the influence of hell and to fight for us (AC 1947). Since being led by the Lord is true freedom, we have more freedom during this time (NJHD 148). Nevertheless, the hells are also pressuring us and we feel less free. These temptations cause pain, anger and emotional suffering as the Lord subdues the hells within you (AC 2819). While it is a struggle to accept and submit to the internal, it is necessary for regeneration, for without the pressure being applied to us, we would never change (AC 1947). Just as the Lord reordered the heavens and hells during the last judgment, He uses temptations to order all things within us (TCR 599). This is why the process is so vital to regeneration.

We are never going to know when we are in a state of true temptation as we cannot know what our internals hold. However, there is always a chance that some of the pressure and pain we experience in our lives comes from spiritual sources such as temptations. As stated above, everything flows from the internal to the external, so emotions must also have a spiritual source. Anxiety can be caused by spirits present with us that are attracted to things that correspond with the stomach, and the cause of the sadness and angst that we experience in the pit of our stomach is from their affections clashing with our own (HH 299). However, the prerequisite of a temptation is that it must be caused by the conflict of internal delights with external delights, for real temptations focus on spiritual issues (DP 141). 

We can parallel this experience with an example to show how our external mind can compel our body to follow. Take for example running a marathon. You don’t just do a marathon, it takes months of training and exercise, each day building your stamina preparing your body for the physical and emotional stress of running twenty-six miles all in one go. But a Marathon isn’t just about physical stamina, the real battle takes place in your mind. During the race, your body is going to beg for a break, every tendon and every ligament will hurt. You will be bombarded with thoughts imploring you to stop and give up. But the mind is stronger than the body and using your mental resolve, you can force your body to keep going one step at a time. The physical and mental pain is excruciating, but your mind can overcome the body, pushing you to achieve your goal, just like the Lord’s good in your internals can subdue your externals, bringing them into alignment. 

Pain isn’t bad, it is just an indicator that something is going on in the inside. The lack of control that we experience in our natural world might be frustrating sometimes, but we should exercise what we do appear to have control over: our choices. Pushing yourself to do things you don’t want to do, such as going for a run or resisting that piece of chocolate cake, is not only good for your external situations and natural desires, it can help you with your self-control on every level. We need to prepare for our own marathons, our temptations, and the best way to do that is to work with what we’ve got, our proprium. We need to work through the pain and act, whether it be changing a bad habit, applying a new truth to our life, or experiencing a temptation. The only way we change is under pressure, just like a diamond.

Of course, we can’t see these changes. We might be able to feel the effects of change. But at the end of the day, if we are working with our natural world to compel our body and our mind into submission, all while acknowledging the Lord, then we are exercising our choice muscles. It doesn’t have to be a marathon; it can be little things, such as choosing to wash the dishes instead of reading your favorite novel or choosing to listen to your friend instead of playing on your phone. No matter how you decide to exercise your ability to choose and to follow through, it will be valuable on an external level, and hopefully, and internal level too. 

Taking a stand!

I implore you, push yourself to do hard things and to go out of your comfort zone, whether it be making a hard decision or pushing yourself to work harder. Exercise your self-compulsion in any way you can, especially when it comes to truths drawn from the Word. Your proprium exits so that you may experience the joys of life, so what's a little pain in return for a closer connection with the Divine? But be prepared: as the Lord draws closer, conflict will ensue. We have to be humble enough to look past our senses for strength and resist doing what we think is right because it feels good. After all, what is good doesn't always feel good. You may not have all the control in the world, but you have what you need. You can choose to resist, and with the Lord’s help, you can change. But we must practice and have patience! These are vital for self-compulsion and resisting evil. It doesn’t get easier to resist evil, quite the contrary, as you battle the hells on your journey towards regeneration, it is bound to get harder. But temptations are good because the Lord is closer! Like any muscle, exercising your self-compulsion makes you stronger and keeps you prepared for the battles that will ensue. So, don't be afraid of the battles ahead. Good luck soldier: may the Lord lead you to victory!