Anthroposophy and the Riddle of the Soul

Because we are accustomed to always thinking in the same sense as the external facts unfold, thinking actually plays a passive role for us in relation to the will that unfolds in it. It becomes actively inwardly active, permeated with inward initiative, when we train it through such exercises as retrospection, where we tear it away from the course of external facts and make it rely on itself. For when we reinforce what we achieve in this way through careful and energetic exercises with truly serious self-observation, observing what we do as a person of will as if we were standing next to us and observing ourselves piece by piece in our development of will; or also when we would go over to action, when we do exercises for the purpose of making a resolution and then executing it with iron energy, so that we live completely in the element of will. I just wanted to mention in principle such exercises that not only tear the will away from external facts, but also from its and its being to the body itself, which make the will independent, spiritualize it - then we actually come to a development of the will in this way, so that we experience ourselves with our soul life, which now develops the will, outside of our body. It is a significant experience.