Who am I / Where did I come from / Where am I going ?

Richard Rose ( 1917 – 2005 ) was an American mystic, esoteric philosopher, author, poet, and investigator of paranormal phenomena. He published a number of books and spoke widely in universities and other venues across the country during the 1970s and 1980s.

He studied human psychology, human weakness and human potential, then wrote challenges to psychology, psychiatry, religion, academia, the legal system, and the New Age movement.

 His criticism included issues of group-think, dogmatism, financial motives, emotional appeals, and reliance on questionable authorities.

Rose developed a system which he described as the "retreat from untruth," an examination of personal belief systems and lifestyles. In that system one discards what one finds to be false on a case-by-case basis. He believed a spiritual Ultimate truth exists and can be found for oneself with sufficient application of effort.

The core questions in the teachings are:

1.   Who am I (ultimately)?

2.   Where did I come from (before birth)?

3.   Where am I going (after death)?

Rose was working in the spring of 1947 as a waiter at a tennis club in Seattle when he experienced what he described as "God Realization". Several months later, he wrote a description of what had occurred in The Three Books of the Absolute.The Three Books of the Absolute - Richard Rose

He used the term "Jacob's Ladder" (image) as a kind of transpersonal map. Based on that, he then used the terms "Law of the Ladder" and "Ladder Work" to describe different levels he observed among those seeking truth.

One student was author Joseph Chilton Pearce. Pearce described him as, "Rose is a no-nonsense West Virginian who wants nothing more from life than to somehow pass on the cataclysmic spiritual experience, the Enlightenment that blind-sided him when he was a young man."

"The highest form of spiritual work is the realization of the essence of man. The final definition of man. And with this definition -- the definition of all things, and a realization of the Nature, Absolute, or God behind all things." Richard Rose

He was a hypnotist, occasionally giving demonstrations, and said that understanding hypnotism was a key to understanding the mechanics of the mind. His criticism of spiritual and New Age movements often included references to their use of self-hypnotic methods.

The TAT Foundation - Philosophical group established by Richard Rose "You never learn the answer; you can only become the answer."

Richard Rose Teachings (Rose Publications) - Official site for his published materials

Those he most highly recommended were Indian guru Ramana Maharshi, Chan master Huang Po, Christian mystics St. John of the Cross and Teresa of Avila, George Gurdjieff, and researchers Paul Brunton and Richard Bucke.