In 150 BCE due to the worldliness of Jerusalem, its temple and Roman rule, a Jewish sect known as the Essenes left their city community and moved into the desert. The word Essene literally means doctor and many dedicated souls gathered in the desert near Qumran in protest. Before the Romans destroyed their community in 70 AD, the Essene’s had already preserved their teachings in numerous Qumran caves, pictured above. The Essenes not only created the Dead Sea Scrolls but also described relationship mirrors, which describe seven important spiritual challenges everyone faces on earth.

The Seven Mirrors of Relationship provide a wonderful psychological and spiritual roadmap to consciousness. We incarnated to express our divinity in human form and mastering these mirrors is how it is done. Ordered sequentially, they describe most important mirror first and finish with the subtlest. “We create our own reality” is a popular belief these days. This article explores the “devils in the details” and what we must do to master them.

1. The Mirror of the Moment.

The Mirror of the Moment states our internal truth, what we have become and our core consciousness will return to us like a boomerang. Phrases like “what goes around comes around” and “you reap that which you sow,” say the same thing. So, in essence the universe basically operates like a giant photocopier. In the West, this phenomena is called cause and effect and in the East…karma. When we see similar joyful and/or angry patterns from those around us, consider it might be a reflection of our inner truth in that present moment. Negative and positive outcomes lie on a continuum. They provide hot and cold feedback about what we send out to the universe actually works or not. People usually choose wisdom or pain as their primary teacher. From a spiritual perspective we learn either way. Since nothing in life is never really over, if we miss our reflection the first time, we can catch it the second, third or fourth time. The Mirror of the Moment states the universe reflects what we radiate. The gravel on the side of the road has a purpose. The stones rattling the undercarriage of our being is a sign to return to terra firma.

2. The Mirror of Judgment.

Whatever we judge, we attract. When people and/or circumstances push our buttons, occasionally it may not be a reflection our current state as described in the first mirror. If we determine the uncomfortable state we experience is not a self-reflection, then judgment may be involved. The Mirror of Judgment states whatever we judge at that moment will activate this mirror.

3. The Mirror of Our Lost Love.

Life is difficult. Everyone gives away or lost something they love in one-way or another to survive. Pain and tragedy cause major disruptions and cutoffs may occur. When we find ourselves in the presence of someone, who activates an internal electrical charge or makes the hair on our arm stand up, pay close attention. We may be in the presence of a lost love or dormant aspect of our self. Immature couples often seek and/or fall for someone, who possesses the qualities they lack. Trying to become whole through a partner is a mistake. The real challenge is developing the qualities we admire within our self. When we fail to recognize the challenges within the Mirror of Our Lost Love, the very qualities we once admired in our partner become a source of judgment.

The Mirror of Our Lost Love states that we will have an electrical/magical attraction to those people, who embody what we have lost, abandoned or gave away. When an innocent soul activates an intoxicating attraction, consider their qualities you admire most. Then embody them yourself. This is how positive reflections can be a subtle reminder from a loving universe through the gentle reflections from the Mirror of Our Lost Love.

4. The Mirrors of Compulsion and Obsession.

Universal mirrors activate when we develop behavioral patterns and mental neural networks that become so important that we reorganize our life to accommodate them. One way to recognize the fourth mirror is activated is when you know down deep you’re being too compulsive and/or obsessive, but can’t stop. This is where addiction in all of it’s devilish forms…alcohol, drugs, money, food, sex, power to name a few…creep in.  This mirror lets us experience psychological and/or physical dependence as we slowly give away parts of ourself most dear to us.

The challenge within all compulsive behaviors and obsessive thoughts is to experience life completely by feeling every feeling from the sublime to most gripping emotions without judging or avoiding our true feelings. All addictions and OCD struggles are attempts to avoid negative feelings or fill voids. However in doing so, we slowly lose something most valuable during our dependence. True love means every aspect of our self is lovable, especially the emotions we rather not endure. Emotions give us feedback about what is working and not working in our life. Negative emotions are similar to an automobile engine warning light. Ignoring warning signals leads to cars and bodies breaking down.

5. The Mirror of Sacred Relationship.

This mirror refers to the way we live our life and our private relationship with the divine. Our primary and possibly most important mirror originates with our parents. Since children perceive everything their parents do or say as a form of love, a Primary Love Template [1] is created. This template informs our sacred relationship dynamics in the following ways:

1. Positive and negative childhood experiences create primary love templates.
2. Parental modeled forms of success/suffering hardwire into our brain.
3. We will treat ourselves in a similar fashion until we transform these patterns.
4. In relationship dynamics, we treat others as we internally treat ourselves.

Thus positive and negative attitudes that our mother, father and caregivers modeled become internal templates that we mirror to our self. The Essene Mirror of Sacred Relationship states this parental primary love template is then applied to our beliefs and expectations from the divine and/or our Heavenly Mother and Father towards us. Templates become mirrors, which reflect our primary attitudes and expectations towards our self and the divine until we transform them.

[1] Eric Ehrke, The Promise of Wholeness, (Rowman and Littlefield Press, 2019), pp34-38.

6. The Mirror of the Dark Night of the Soul.

The Dark Night of the Soul blows up emotional security blankets for a purpose like it did, when locusts, floods and plagues afflicted Egypt in biblical times. Pain and suffering humbles everyone—including powerful pharaohs. A problem of epic proportions always narrows our attention and pries open closed minds. The desire for relief motivates us to reexamine every illusion weighting us down. When life kicks away our crutches, many collapse and believe that the divine has abandoned us. Rise up and reexamine every template, paradigm and principle to sort out if it retains value. Surrendering every sacred cow, like power and control, will help you determine what creates more love or recycles pain. This awareness is necessary to navigate through the darkest illusions this world offers. When we can see suffering as an opportunity to create grace and mastery, life becomes easier.

The mirror of illusion and life on earth is brutal often enough. On top of that an abandonment imprint occurs when we sever our divine connection to experience earth. The resulting existential agony is called the Dark Night of the Soul. It feels like the divine left us, but we choose to incarnate to forget our origins, remember our spiritual home and eventually realize that we were never, ever, for one microsecond abandoned. We are also here to love and use our hearts, mind, and body to find the source of the deepest truths about our true nature. I would describe what we are doing as playing a game of hide-and-seek with divinity and our soul. Everyone goes through the Seven Mirrors of Relationship so we can see our reflection along the way. By merging our body, heart and soul on earth we can bathe in the sea of pure love everyday ourselves. When we truly accept our destiny by listening to the Dark Knight’s wakeup calls and healing our abandonment imprint, we will experience our own divinity. When we become immune to illusion, we won’t attract the Mirror of the Dark Night of the Soul.

7. The Mirror of Divine Order.

This is the subtlest and perhaps the most difficult mirror to master. The Mirror of Divine Order states that whatever we experience in life…both the good and bad is perfect.  The challenge within this mirror also requires us to ignore the limits and expectations of others. When we view an outcome as a success or failure, we’ve applied an external yardstick. The only point of reference within this seventh mirror needs to come from self.  Compassion has three components. Thought without attachment to outcome, feeling without distortion and emotion without charge. Denial blocks feeling. Feeling opens the door to compassion. Recognizing there is Divine Order while others or we suffer develops mastery. Humanity learns through pleasure and pain. On the other side of the veil there is no difference or judgment as which path is used to embody one’s divinity on earth.

On the topic of Divine Order, Viktor Frankl (1905–1997) after surviving the Holocaust wrote in his book, Man’s Search for Meaning: “If there is meaning in life at all, then there must be meaning in suffering.” [2] That meaning is found when we reach a state of incorruptible equanimity beyond the trenches of reciprocal chaos and divine retribution. A pragmatic man, Frankl believed that humanity needed to recognize that the ultimate purpose for our suffering would always remain a mystery. The choices made in the aftermath of a tragedy, the meaning of our existence and the principles we use to guide our life is what he thought mattered most. The freedom to choose how we respond or react to victimization and terrorism always rests within. Frankl’s observations about human nature, when people are subjected to inhumane treatment are timeless and eternal. The simplest mirror, the ability to accept everything that happens in our life is in Divine Order is extremely hard to accomplish.

[2] Viktor Frankl, Man’s Search For Meaning (Washington Square Press, 1959), page 88.