The Core Albigen System Principles of Richard Rose

In his own words, with citations

For works cited please see Richard Rose Author Page

1. Law of the Reverse Vector. Retreating from error, backing away from untruth, erosion of ignorance. A system of becoming.

“The Law of the Reverse Vector states that you cannot approach the Truth. You must become (a vector), but you cannot learn the absolute Truth. We must back into the Truth by backing away from untruth.”

~ Richard Rose, The Albigen Papers

“You are basically a vector. You are what you do. Every man is what he does.”

~ Richard Rose, lecture, November, 1977, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, “Method of Going Inside”

“This whole process is a retreat from error, not a planting of a postulation and then massing all of our forces to prove that postulation. It is taking zero, and building from zero. When we ask ourselves, ‘Who am I?’ we are taking an initial step. We do not begin by saying I am this or that.”

~ Richard Rose, The Psychology of the Observer

“… if you train yourself to avoid the untrue, to reject and reject and reject as you find stuff absurd, you can only go in the opposite direction. Your intuition is going to be skilled or directed or trained to move into a computation that is valid—as opposed to something that you’d just like to believe because you’re tired.”

~ Richard Rose, lecture, April 28, 1977, Kent State University, “Zen and Common Sense”

“We find that there is only one way, and that is to first build of ourselves a very determined person—a vector. We cut off tangential dissipaters of energy and ball up this energy for the work ahead.”

~ Richard Rose, The Albigen Papers

2. Studying the mind with the mind. Becoming a watcher of thoughts and feelings, a watcher of the rational and intuitive nature of the mind.

Jacob’s Ladder. Click to see full size, back button to return.

“The Process Observer (E) cannot study itself. We may become aware of observing processes, and the polar point F becomes awareness. It is for this reason that the observation position does not go on indefinitely in regards to the mind’s observing itself. The Process Observer is the mind in its maximum ability to observe the individual and its complexities. It constitutes the all of the mind, with all of the abilities of that mind in all dimensions.

~ Richard Rose, The Psychology of the Observer

“The Process Observer is the mind watching the mind from behind the clouds of delusion in consciousness. Everything within its view is of the mind, as by this point, it is realized that one’s entire experience of life—sensations, perceptions, thoughts, feelings, memories, egos, etc.—is a mental experience, and not external…”

~ John Kent, Richard Rose’s The Psychology of the Observer: The Path to Reality Through the Self

“Until the Process Observer is defined from another plane of reference, it continues to make a major mistake. It works incessantly at trying to define the mind with the mind. … So the Process Observer proudly watches the mind from and with the mind and gets nowhere until an accident occurs, and the individual conceives new variables to be considered as to the cause and nature of the mind itself.”

~ Richard Rose, The Psychology of the Observer

“The Process Observer—in its seemingly infinite problems, comparisons and ramifications—finds, accidentally, a means to explore the mind on all levels. It can be said another way. By accident our awareness transcends the mind.”

~ Richard Rose, The Psychology of the Observer

3. The spiritual search is a top priority. Relentless determination. Commitment.

“The formula is very basic. Make a commitment, make a contract with yourself to be honest. Don’t kid yourself. This is basically the study of truth, going to the truth of things.”

~ Richard Rose, interview, Nov. 19, 1977, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Link to Article

“And strangely enough I was protected. And I want to say this very sincerely. I believe that once the commitment is made to find your Truth at all costs, some interior or anterior self sets up protection. It may even set up the whole path. You can call it God, or the guardian angel, or a spiritual alliance, if you wish. Something sets up protection. Now I do not want you to feel too secure, because uncertainty and despair are part of the formula, it seems, for finding the final door or breakthrough. The despair is necessary to pop the head, after the long ordeal of running between raindrops.”

~ Richard Rose, The Psychology of the Observer, University Lectures, 1977 and 1978,

“If you want to do something—if you want to be successful—you make a total expenditure of energy to the greatest ability. You put your whole being into it. You don’t do it two hours a day. You make a total commitment to that, and this involves all levels.”

~ Richard Rose, lecture, June 26, 1983, “Are We Complete?”

“Results are directly proportional to energy applied. If you’re only going to work with half your effort, if you’re going to be half-hearted, you’re only going to get half-hearted results. You may wind up with half-hearted rationalizations. Whereas if you make a total commitment and a total determination, say to become a millionaire, chances are you’ll become a millionaire, given average intelligence. And I apply the same thing to spiritual work. It’s just as sensible to me.”

~ Richard Rose, lecture, April 5, 1977, Columbus, Ohio

4. Milk from thorns. Using nature’s implants, such as curiosity and desire, by turning these drives toward the spiritual search.

“It’s what I call ‘milk from thorns’. You’re setting up a new type of process. If you get obstacles, those very obstacles can be used to accelerate your growth into an understanding of yourself.”

~ Richard Rose, lecture, June 10, 1983, Denver, Colorado, “First Know Thyself”

“Part of the system that I advise in The Albigen Papers is that we make milk from thorns. These very things which are negative can be turned, the energy taken from them, and this energy used in progression—in finding goals faster.”

~ Richard Rose, “Lecture at Boston College”, November 19, 1975, in The Direct-Mind Experience

On meditation: “There are still many compulsions coming from body habits. Perhaps you are doing this when you would ordinarily be at work, or taking your daily walk. Habits set little alarms in the computer and they go off with regularity, if the habit had regularity. So in order to harvest milk from thorns in this instance, it is a good idea to set aside a certain time for meditation, for every day, and encourage the habit.”

~ Richard Rose, The Psychology of the Observer

5. Friendship. Fellow seekers serving as mirrors. A system of confrontation. Law of the Ladder and Law of Extra-Proportional Returns. Rapport.

“We come now to a very important conclusion. There is no religion greater than human friendship. Now this conclusion should not be quoted out of context. It does not mean that people are greater than truth. It does not mean that we should worship humanity or individuals. In fact, I strongly oppose getting the idea of love and friendship mixed in deciding the attitude of the student toward the teacher, especially if the student cannot discriminate between physical love and platonic devotion.”

~ Richard Rose, The Albigen Papers

“We need to live in a truthful manner in order to be consistent with ourselves and with our friends—because these are the mirrors of ourselves, even if we’re going the trip alone.”

~ Richard Rose, lecture, 1976, Kent State University, “Definition of Zen”

“We need to trust any man whom we accept as a teacher, because he holds in trust our hopes for salvation or enlightenment, as well as our sanity, which, until we make the final jump, is the only true communication with our essence or absolute being.”

~ Richard Rose, The Albigen Papers

“By his commitment, the teacher reaches down to help the helpless. The helpless, before receiving help, should make the commitment that when they succeed in any degree, they will act in a sincere desire to help their fellows. Before the helpless become (reach the Absolute), they have thus made a commitment that will set in motion at least their minds and physical bodies in the direction of teaching and helping others, and even setting an example …”

~ Richard Rose, The Threefold Path: The Way, the Life & the Truth. Chart of the Detailed Steps.

Law of the Ladder:”We do not visualize a single man upon each rung, reaching down, pulling up the man below. We find that the ladder is ‘A’ shaped, pyramid in form, for one thing. There are less people on the higher rungs than on the lower rungs. We will be lucky if we can find one man who can help us, but we should be working with six or more on the rung below. We also find a new meaning for the brotherhood now. The man above may be pulling up the man below,—but they are pushing him a bit, at the same time.”

~ Richard Rose, The Albigen Papers

“The Law of Extra Proportional Returns can be effected only with the cooperation of friends. The Law … infers an unexpected increment. To draw an analogy, two factors (human) working together will accomplish more results together, than will either of the two factors in twice as much time. This is also known as the Contractor’s Law. If this law did not exist, no contractor would hire men. It would all be done by individuals working alone. We apply the same principle to spiritual work. We must work in groups, in other words. You can call them brotherhoods or societies, or you can work in groups without a name.”

~ Richard Rose, The Albigen Papers

6. Transmutation of energy. To sharpen intuition and to protect ourselves from entities, outside influences, and nature’s distractions.

“Mystics must have found that celibacy was amenable to the search, or they would have given up after a hundred years or more of the experiment.”

~ Richard Rose, The Albigen Papers

“Since the sex-act has a definite impact upon the mind, inasmuch as it is able to alter states of mind, or to bring about deceptive states of mind, it is worthwhile to assume that the inhibition or control of the sex-act will somehow inhibit or control a state of mind that is not conducive to our search.”

~ Richard Rose, The Albigen Papers

“If exorcism is a workable function, that demonstrates that there are entities who are able to seriously affect our lives and behavior, then it is the responsibility of the psychiatric scientist to broaden their scope, not to pretend that the whole concept of entities will go away if we ignore it.”

~ Richard Rose,

“If the purpose of mankind is to produce energy for other beings, which may not be visible to us, then that energy would need to be subtle because we are not visibly attacked and eaten. This theory of the existence of entity-parasites, does not automatically bring with it the need to accept these entities as being of superior essence. They would no doubt be strategically superior, but then so would a mosquito, or flea, if either were able to tap our veins, drink, and get away without our knowing it.”

~ Richard Rose, Energy Transmutation Between-ness and Transmission

“In regards to kundalini, sex was designed for propagation, but applying the principle, ‘Milk from thorns’, it becomes quantum energy—for transmission or projection.”

~ Richard Rose, personal correspondence with John Kent, contained in Richard Rose’s The Psychology of the Observer: The Path to Reality Through the Self

“These findings add more meaning to my advice on the needs of celibacy, and the different approaches to celibacy by the different sexes—which advice came about as a result of intuition. Consequently I take a step further and by giving my life’s experiment as a witness, assert that intuition itself is directly related to celibacy and the management of prostaglandins.”

~ Richard Rose, “The Psychology of Miracles”, February 15, 1981, Akron, Ohio, in The Direct-Mind Experience

See Richard Rose: Prostaglandins and Morality

See Mark Jaqua: Conservation Therapy.

7. Turning the internal head back to “dead center”. Relates to between-ness.

“If you think of a foot that is itching, you mentally turn away from it. If the nose starts to itch, it does not matter if you scratch it or not, but immediately turn away from it. One at a time a hundred things will pop up, and the early exercises in such meditation will be an exercise in deflecting any and all thoughts except the ones which we agreed to tolerate, long before we sat down to think about it.

“Something happens after this routine is practiced for a length of time. We begin to notice a motion within the head. The physical head does not move, but we become conscious of a mental head that literally turns away from a view. When you are able to turn this internal head, whenever you wish, without any inability to continue thinking, you are half way home.”

~ Richard Rose, The Psychology of the Observer

“Now from this contemplation, the dashing back and forth across this upper line (E-F) [in Jacob’ Ladder], man arrives at an Absolute realization. He arrives at a point in which his head is on dead-center. There’s no place left for it to go.

“What happens when the head is on dead-center? Almost anything. My reason for putting it in the book was not so much for healing as for realization. It is more important to realize who you are and what you are than it is to heal someone.

“So the first profit that comes from having your head on dead-center is an Absolute realization of yourself. And then of course, if the experience doesn’t kill you, you might be able to do something on a mundane level.”

~ Richard Rose, “The Psychology of Miracles”, February 15, 1981, Akron, Ohio, in The Direct-Mind Experience

8. The outer mind outwits the essential self.

“When one part of a man fools the other part, then the part that has been fooled is the essential self.”

~ Richard Rose, The Psychology of the Observer

“Now to get around that unreliable mind, you have to become a super-psychologist; you have to know when you’re outwitting yourself. Now this may sound difficult to some of you—if you haven’t done any spiritual work on yourself you may not know what I’m talking about—but anybody who has tried to do any type of spiritual work will know they outwit themselves. It’s that simple.”

~ Richard Rose, lecture, April 26, 1977, Cleveland, Ohio, “Introduction to the Albigen System”

“We must be determined, yet we should never be ‘up-tight.’ Our perseverance should be in the head, watching how we outwit ourselves, or how nature outwits our fumbling attempts.”

~ Richard Rose, Energy Transmutation Between-ness and Transmission

9. Conciliatory principle between opposites. Leaps in perspective. Umpire (Somatic Awareness). Process Observer. Absolute Awareness.

“We live in a relative world in which there is no wisdom; only linear thinking; duality not singularity. Stuck with linear thinking. But we have to see both from the conciliatory principle. You can’t know until you get above it. You won’t know what mental troubles are until you get above the mind. You can’t understand the mind with the mind.”

~ Richard Rose, lecture, November 20, 1981, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, “The Psychology of Miracles”

“So this fellow up at the top (point C) [on Jacob’s Ladder], this conciliatory principle, is the Umpire. We notice, if we observe our self, that something up there is saying, ‘Yesterday you were wrong, today you’re right.’ There’s an observing process going on inside the mind; a decision making process that has to do with the perpetuation of that body. That’s all it is; it’s a somatic mind.”

~ Richard Rose, lecture, 1978 or 1979, New Age Bookstore, Los Angeles, California

“We have a body-umpire that says don’t do this or that. But when you get to where you’re bickering with yourself over emotions that may louse up your mind, then the only thing that will save you is the observer. As Benoit says, behind, the third point of the pyramid, the conciliatory principle, the ‘I’ watching the whole straight-line experience of birth and death.”

~ Richard Rose, June 1, 1991, evening of hypnosis demonstration, Rose Farm

10. A system of between-ness.

“Thought, no-thought results in Absolute realization. Now if it was an algebraic equation then my answer would be somewhere between thought and no-thought or ‘half-thought.’ No. What it is, must be found by trying it—you do it, you live it… and this is what happens! You reach an Absolute realization by looking between thoughts.”

~ Richard Rose, “Lecture on Between-ness”, 1980, Columbus, Ohio, in The Direct-Mind Experience

“Between-ness is a methodicity. This is another one of the laws that I was referring to. There is a certain way that you are able to hold your head just on perfect balance, not being to the left or to the right.”

~ Richard Rose, “Lecture at Boston College”, November 19, 1975, in The Direct-Mind Experience

“Down below the word wisdom I have written something else—’being’ and ‘Between-ness.’ The inner Self I capitalize, and the outer self is the fellow you smile at in the mirror. Your higher Self is synonymous with your Source. You don’t learn this through reason, and you don’t learn it always through crude intuition or superstition. It has to be perfected intuition and perfected reason. By this I mean the intuition has to be tempered with the reason. This causes, through wisdom—a change of being. It may be gradual, so gradual he does not notice it. What has changed him is this word ‘Between-ness’ because I have no other word for it even though it sounds like a very plain word. It is the conciliatory principle and the things that result from being between, never allowing yourself to flop fanatically to one polar opposite or the other.”

~ Richard Rose, “Lecture on Between-ness”, 1980, Columbus, Ohio, in The Direct-Mind Experience

11. Awareness vs Process Observer. Awareness (non-mind) as an “opposite” of the Process Observer (mind).

“A third step is taken, and this is the last step, and this is when you’ve pretty much exhausted [the egos]—you automatically become—you’ve cleared out all the cobwebs and you don’t know where else to look. You don’t know yourself totally, you just know what to expect under certain conditions. A strange combination. You become aware not of a composite being, but of an observer on one side and an awareness on the other. The investigation of the life inside the human being, thinking objectively, boiling it down to just awareness.”

~ Richard Rose, lecture, June 10, 1983, Denver, Colorado, “First Know Thyself”

“Behind the Process Observer is the self that only watches the Process Observer without qualification. This is awareness—this is getting close to the Absolute.”

~ Richard Rose, lecture, 1979, as quoted by John Kent, Richard Rose’s The Psychology of the Observer: The Path to Reality Through the Self

“Rose has explained that the Process Observer is of the Manifested Mind, whereas its complementary pole, which he calls Individualized Consciousness of Awareness, is of the Unmanifested Mind; the full entrance into which is ‘the Mountain Experience.’ ”

~ John Kent, Richard Rose’s The Psychology of the Observer: The Path to Reality Through the Self

“And by watching it, I could find myself. I could pick myself out in this—I call it the Cavalcade of Life. Then I realized that this tiny man and the Observer were one. And not only that, but the Observer—the final Observer—is the Absolute.”

~ Richard Rose, lecture, October 22, 1974, Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, Ohio, published in TAT Journal as “Zen, Spiritual Steps & Spiritual Systems”

12. A system of Tension.

“You need to build your capacity for the work. You need to be strong enough to withstand the forces of adversity that will rise up against you. The way to increase your capacity is to push beyond it. The measure of a man is his ability to endure tension.”

~ Richard Rose, After The Absolute: The Inner Teachings of Richard Rose by David Gold with Bart Marshall

“Tension is, beyond a doubt, the reason for seeking for the Universal constant. Tension, like God, makes us look for it, or understand it.”

~ Richard Rose, Energy Transmutation Between-ness and Transmission

“The experience of Satori itself occurs as a result of the explosion or ‘going over the top’ or ‘going over the mountain’ of that climax of tension. In satori there is no tension. That is, after Satori is experienced, there is no more tension.”

~ Richard Rose, Energy Transmutation Between-ness and Transmission

“You take the mind first in thought, and then have the mind in no-thought, and you have an absolute realization.… You bring yourself to the point of anxiety by Zen techniques, into where the mind actually goes blank from the tension.”

~ Richard Rose, “The Psychology of Miracles”, February 15, 1981, Akron, Ohio, in The Direct-Mind Experience

“If a person can’t take the tension and wants to throw in the towel on the search, I certainly won’t stand in his way. But be careful. If you’re going to surrender to illusion, at least make it an attractive illusion.”

~ Richard Rose, After The Absolute: The Inner Teachings of Richard Rose by David Gold with Bart Marshall

13. Transmission.

“When the day comes that you have something of importance to convey or transmit to another individual, which cannot be conveyed in words even though many words of wisdom are available, you may be able to transmit that state of awareness or being, by the singular process of direct-mind contact, and a skillful control of your own mind so that nothing else but nothing will pervade your mind…and his. Men have traveled thousands of miles, and sat in monasteries for decades to learn this.”

~ Richard Rose, The Psychology of the Observer

Citing one of Bodhidharma’s four principles of Zen: “A special transmission outside the scriptures means there’s a way of putting this inside another person’s head. There is a way of realization by being associated with a person who has reached the goal of knowledge of Self. Unless your system of Zen has that, it is not a true system of Zen. If you have a teacher who cannot do it, you do not have a teacher who can take you.”

~ Richard Rose, lecture, April 26, 1977, Cleveland, Ohio, “Introduction to the Albigen System”

14. Doubt. Backing into reality by questioning everything.

“We must learn to doubt, not only the verbal testimony of others, but the persuasions of our own beliefs, and keep looking for symptoms of self-delusion…”

~ Richard Rose, The Psychology of the Observer

“You don’t find any truth by believing. You find it by doubting everything. Including myself.”

~ Richard Rose, August Chautauqua, 1983, in The Direct-Mind Experience

“…you should believe nothing, including what I say as well. You should doubt. To doubt is sacred—to believe is foolishness. Because believing is an easy way out—it’s a cop-out.”

~ Richard Rose, The Psychology of the Observer

“…you have to doubt everything but your ability. If you doubt your ability you won’t try.”

~ Richard Rose, lecture, April 26, 1977, Cleveland, Ohio, “Introduction to the Albigen System”

15. Miscellaneous Tips

“Set the house in order. This means that we must find some economic security, we must keep the physical house healthy, as it will either quit thinking or think unreliably, and we must adjust the domestic scene so that people with whom we live will be amenable to the search.”

~ Richard Rose, The Threefold Path: The Way, the Life & the Truth. Chart of the Detailed Steps.

“Rose had always recommended short periods of isolation for anyone serious about spiritual work. As a young man he’d bought what he later called his ‘back’ farm strictly as a meditation retreat for himself. The time he spent there—reading, meditating, fasting—he recalled as some of the happiest and most spiritually productive times of his life.

“He warned against too much solitude, however. In his opinion, one or two 30-day isolations a year was about right. He believed that maximum spiritual progress was achieved through a blend of silent introspection and worldly life.”

~ David Gold, After The Absolute: The Inner Teachings of Richard Rose by David Gold with Bart Marshall

[ end ]

Source: “The Core Albigen System Principles of Richard Rose, compiled by Paul Constant. PDF (12 pages) at SearchWithin.Org

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