{"corpus":"steiner","locus":"GA 13/l05/p045","lang":"en","edition":"RSP1969","edition_basis":null,"is_original":false,"is_default_edition":true,"text":"As if in the world of thought, so also in the sphere of the will, the self has to become master. Here too, as long as we remain in the world of the physical senses, life itself may be said to be our master. Some vital need asserts itself and the will feels impelled to satisfy the need. But one who undergoes a higher training has to acquire the habit of strict obedience to what he tells himself to do on his own initiative. In learning this he will be less and less inclined to cherish pointless desires. Dissatisfaction and instability in the life of will come from setting one's heart on some aim, of the realization of which one has formed no clear notion. Dissatisfaction of this kind can bring the whole inner life into disorder at the moment when a higher self is ready to come forth from the soul. A good exercise for the will is, every day for months on end, to give oneself the command: Today you are to do *this*, at this particular hour. One will gradually manage to fix the hour and the nature of the task so as to render the command perfectly possible to carry out. In this way we rise above that deplorable state of mind which finds expression in words such as: I would like to do this, I wish I could do that—when all the time there is no real expectation of fulfillment. A great poet made a prophetess say: “Him I love who craves for the impossible”[^2] And the same poet says in his own name: “To live in the Idea is to treat the impossible as thought it were possible.”[^3] Such words should however not be quoted as refuting the above recommendation. For the demand that Goethe and his prophetess (Manto) are making can only be met by one who has first educated himself in the achievement of desires that *are* possible of fulfillment—in order then, by dint of his strengthened will, to be able to treat the “impossible” in such a way as to change it by his will into the possible.","text_trust":"verbatim","quote_safe":true,"title":"V. Knowledge of the Higher Worlds—Concerning Initiation","site_heading":null,"date":null,"location":null,"word_count":357,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/13/l05/p045","alignment_confidence":"low","alignment_reason":"count_diverges","two_voice_volume":false,"translation_credit":null,"edition_coverage":{"de":["original"],"en":["AP1972","RSP1969"]},"available_versions":[{"lang":"de","edition":"original","edition_basis":null,"is_original":true,"is_default_edition":true,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/de/ga/13/l05/p045"},{"lang":"en","edition":"RSP1969","edition_basis":null,"is_original":false,"is_default_edition":true,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/13/l05/p045"},{"lang":"en","edition":"AP1972","edition_basis":null,"is_original":false,"is_default_edition":false,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/13/l05/p045?edition=AP1972","paragraph_aligned":true}],"witness_completeness":{"ratio":1.19,"band":"comparable","note":null,"word_count":29965,"original_word_count":25157,"may_be_abridged":false},"witness_quality":{"translator":{"status":"unknown","warning":"No translator is recorded for this edition. An unattributed translation cannot be weighed as a witness: you cannot tell which hand made the choices in it. Cite the German for anything load-bearing."},"entity_parity":{"status":"not_checkable","note":"No verified paragraph alignment covers this passage, so its names cannot be compared with the German."},"note":"quote_safe certifies the bytes of this text. This block is about the translation as a WITNESS: who made it, and whether it carries the same names as the original. See witness_completeness for how much of the original this witness holds."}}