Meditations and Exercises
Rudolf Steiner provided extensive instructions and exercises for personal development. He describes a hidden world that flows through the material world, thereby manifesting as our reality. To understand the role of the human being and why we are here, one must apply oneself to this endeavour.
Unlike teachings based primarily on belief, Steiner's path for such esoteric study is a cognitive one of what he terms, Spiritual Science. It is one of gnosis—higher knowledge of spiritual matters. He posits we can learn to know how to experience the spiritual realms as a reality through our thinking, feeling and willing. The choice of whether or not to learn and practice this knowledge is ours.
[J]ust as one does not need to be a painter to feel the beauty of a picture, so too one does not need to be a spiritual scientist oneself—although one can become one up to a point—to be able to test whether what I am saying here is true. Just as one can feel the beauty of a picture without being a painter oneself, so with ordinary common sense one can perceive what the spiritual scientist says about the soul. That one can see it, I think I have established all the more firmly in recognizing how souls thirst for a profounder approach to psychology and to the great riddles of existence in relation to the soul.
—Rudolf Steiner, 2 June 1922, Vienna.
To promote wider adoption of the spiritual practices outlined by Rudolf Steiner, we have compiled a summary of fundamental texts. These include foundational teachings, meditative verses and mantras, prayers and other exercises. We hope you will take this information to heart during this critical time in human evolution. If we do not choose to develop ourselves now, we may lose the opportunity.
| Type | Topic | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Study | Essential Reading | Selected Chapters from Steiner's Foundational Books which are essential to learn before commencing a practice. |
| Study | Additional Reading | Lectures and other writings on Esoteric Development |
| Exercise | I am. It thinks. She feels. He wills. | Morning meditation striving for complete inner stillness, beginning with "In purest outpoured Light... See alternate lecture in GA 266 categorized as a meditation (In pure rays of light...). |
| Exercise | The Six Basic Attributes & Exercises |
|
| Exercise | Subsidiary exercises for the days of the week | Exercises for right opinion, right judgment, right word, right deed, right standpoint, to let all of the foregoing exercises become a habit, right memory, and right examination. |
| Exercise | The Backward Review or Retrospect (Rückshau) | A review of the day's events (or a greater period) every night before sleeping. |
| Exercise | The Great Karma Exercise | A four-day, three night practice to assist in the understanding of one's karmic relationships given the day after Steiner had given the very First Class. |
| Meditation | In pure rays of light... | Verse for spiritual forces to stream into the soul and out into the world |
| Meditation | The Calendar of the Soul | Powerful weekly verses to practice throughout the seasons and festivals of the year. |
| Meditation | The Foundation Stone Meditation | Verses to enliven us with the spirit of anthroposophy, given by Rudolf Steiner after the burning of the first Goetheanum. |
| Meditation | The Twelve Moods | Verses embodying the cosmic influences on the human being of the planetary movements playing the instrument of the fixed stars, given to eurythmists in order to bring the twelve cosmic consonants and seven cosmic vowels into movement on earth. |
| Meditation | The Twelve (Monthly) Virtues | These virtues assigned to the zodiac signs come from H. P. Blavatsky and Rudolf Steiner added a condition resulting from the meditation upon and practice of each virtue. |
| Meditation | The Rose Cross Meditation | Symbolic meditation for soul development as given in Steiner's foundational book, Occult Science. |
| Meditation | The Michael Imagination | Verse for spiritual understanding of autumn's meteoric iron in relation to Michael's sword as given on October 5, 1923 (GA 229) |
| Meditation | The Michael Meditation | Verse given in Rudolf Steiner's last lecture on September 28, 1924 (GA 238) |
| Meditation | In the spirit lay the germ of my body...In my body lies the germ of the spirit. | Verse for the love of humanity |
| Meditation | Angels, Archangels and Archai... | Verses describe how the spiritual Hierarchies progressively transmute the fruits of man's earthly life during the stages of death. |
| Meditation | Man As A Picture of the Living Spirit | Verse to confront the Darkness; lecture describes how the spiritual Hierarchies work within the human body. "We realize that here on Earth we are only a picture of our true Being—that our true Being never comes down into the earthly life. Yet in the midst of the Darkness, through our good will towards the Spirit, a Light can dawn upon us, of which we may in truth confess: This Light am I myself in my reality." |
| Prayer | The Lord's Prayer | Rudolf Steiner's booklet giving an esoteric explanation of The Lord's Prayer revealing the path which man must tread through many incarnations |
| Prayer | Prayers for Mothers and Children | A compilation of prayers contained in GA 40; contains Rudolf Steiner's Morning Prayer, Evening Prayer, and Grace for mealtime |
| Prayer | Spirits ever watchful... | Verses given by Rudolf Steiner prior to meetings during WWI for those who have passed through the gate of death. |