The long period of search for the Neutralizing Force of the Work begins when you realize that you are not working in the right way. This realization is a passing feeling, a momentary taste.

It is necessary for us to have the opposites in us before we can think for ourselves and with individual thinking through the power of the Work something comes that unites the opposites.

If there were no Neutralizing or connecting force, Active and Passive Forces would stand in opposition to one another and nothing could happen. Now if the connecting force alters, the other two forces alter. We have to think of Neutralizing Force as something capable of tilting the balance between Active and Passive Force in such a way that active can become passive, and passive become active.

If you deal cleverly with this 2nd force it will give you results and, instead of being simply a blind, opposing force, will become gradually what you want. You do not instantly become negative when opposed. You try this way and that, and gradually this formidable opposition yields and becomes what you want—or, let us say, rather, what is possible in your wanting.

We really do not know what we want—that is, we are not conscious in 1st Force in us. If we take what we want, desire, wish for, expect, hope for, as 1st Force, then, whatever the nature of our wish, it will arouse a specific and definite 2nd Force that opposes the wish.

To be conscious in First Force is to know what one wants; to be conscious in Second Force is to know what difficulties stand in the way; and to be conscious in Third Force at the same time is to be conscious of how what one wants and what opposes it can eventually reach some solution.