923. In this way all the aforementioned phenomena in our experience of life are due solely to the fact that our I is capable of assembling around itself fellow beings that belong to lower spirals, uniting them in a mutual co-operation between itself and the fellow beings. We see this assembly of beings as the I's organism, just as we know this co-operation as the I's vital functions. But in order for this co-operation to be able to be set in motion, the beings must be at the favourable stages or sections in their own spiral. A physical organism cannot be built up of beings all of which are in the spiritual part of their spirals, just as a spiritual organism cannot be built up of beings that are in the physical part of their spirals. We know from earlier sections of "Livets Bog" that a spiral appears in six different stages or sections, which in turn divide the spiral into a spiritual and a physical part.
      When the I is about to create a physical organism it naturally has to assemble the material it is going to use from beings on underlying spirals. It cannot use fellow beings from its own spiral, as they are not far enough below or sufficiently microscopic. It has to unite with beings from underlying spirals. But it is not enough that these beings are from underlying spirals; they must also be from the physical part of their spirals, otherwise they would not have physical organisms and could not constitute the physical material from which the I, or macrobeing, would be able to build up its physical organism. The I connects with beings, from lower spirals, that are at the entrance to the physical world. But as the appearance of these beings from underlying spirals is of a faster tempo in the spiral cycle than the I or the macrobeing, they arrive more quickly at the spiritual part in their spirals than the I does in its spiral. And this gives rise to the calamity that their physical organisms degenerate and become weaker as physical material for the I, until finally they become completely unusable, at which point the connection with the I is broken. This degeneration or weakening is what we call "old age", just as the breaking of the connection in its coarsest or strongest form is what we know as "death".
      But in the same way that there is a degeneration or weakening in the connection between the I and the life-forms that make up the material for its body, there is also a development that strengthens this connection. This comes about through the discarnate being, from the beginning of the formation of its embryo, attracting only those life forms with which to build up its physical organism that, along with itself, are next in line to incarnate into physical matter. Of these beings the most microscopic will naturally be the first to make themselves evident, followed by the others as they approach the spiral lying directly below the I's own spiral. As it is in particular the beings in this last spiral before the I's spiral that are the principal ones in the I's or the macrobeing's organism, their appearance will indicate "growth" or "development" until they in their own spiral have passed the area that corresponds to the area where the macrobeing is in its spiral. The point at which the principal beings that make up the material of the macrobeing's organism pass the stage in their spiral that corresponds to the macrobeing's stage in its spiral is when this being is at the peak of its manifestation of life. Before this point the macrobeing's physical manifestation will have an upwards tendency, whereas after this time it will have a downwards tendency, until the contact with the life forms in its body becomes so weak that it breaks down altogether, and so-called "death" ensues.
      Let us take another look at this problem. We have before us, for example, a terrestrial human being. We see its physical existence beginning as a tiny embryo in the womb. At the onset of this stage its I begins, as the result of its natural attraction through its talent kernels, to connect with the discarnate beings that, like the terrestrial human being, are next in line to incarnate, but belong to underlying spirals. The terrestrial human being's I will use these discarnate fellow beings to set in motion its main vital functions, such as the functioning of the heart, brain, lungs, digestion, glands etc. The organs through which these functions take place consist of the physical bodies of living beings, but from the "organ spiral", that is to say the spiral that is immediately below that of the terrestrial human being. These "organ beings" also need organs in their organisms and attract in the same way discarnate fellow beings from a lower spiral, which to the terrestrial human being constitutes the "cell-spiral". These "cell beings" that they have attracted must naturally also build for themselves physical bodies and attract beings from spirals that are even further below, and which we have referred to in "Livets Bog" under the collective term, the "atom spiral". Whereas the beings from the other spirals are attracted by the I of the terrestrial human being, that is to say the macrobeing, only in their discarnate state, the beings from the "atom spiral" on the other hand are attracted by the macrobeing only in their incarnate state. These atom- or microbeings are therefore bound to constitute some form of physical material that is vitally necessary to the macrobeing, for example, food and drink. The I's interaction with these beings is consequently of a more directly physical nature. It is this attraction that we know as "hunger" and "thirst". By being digested the microbeings in question are transferred into the macrobeing's organism where they provide mutual life and development for the small beings themselves as well as the macrobeing. But these small beings belong to microspirals. And their stay in the terrestrial human being's organism, that is to say the length of these small beings' terrestrial lives, therefore lasts, in the case of the "cell beings", only some months, whereas for beings in the atom spiral or for even more microscopic life-forms it lasts only seconds. During these few months or seconds the foremost of these small individuals therefore each experience a terrestrial life with its childhood, youth, maturity and old age. This means that the I of the terrestrial human being is able to continue to renew its organism with material from these two spirals. The small beings can live and die in this organism without the macro-organism having to die. The macrobeing would thus be able to create an eternally unbroken, continual, physical existence, were it not for the fact that this attraction or renewal has to take place with the help of beings from the "organ spiral", that is to say its own heart, brain, lungs, stomach etc. The fact that these "organ beings" have, from their discarnate state, been able to be connected with the I of the terrestrial human being, is due solely to a longing or attraction within them towards the physical plane, towards the physical form of existence. They had within them a certain form of hunger or craving, which, as a result of this attraction, worked towards its satisfaction. Through the connection with the terrestrial human being's I and the consequent physical incarnation as organs in the terrestrial human being's physical organism, this hunger is eventually satisfied, and the organ beings are satiated with physical existence. Whereas this kind of hunger provides a stimulus that creates power and direction towards physical life and well-being, the corresponding satisfaction brings about a relaxation or weakening in this direction. The functions become weaker and gradually defective. And as the organism of the terrestrial human being's I or the macrobeing consists solely of these very organs, the decrease in their efficiency thus becomes evident as the aforementioned increasing weakness of the organism that we term "old age", and which eventually breaks the connection between the organ beings and the macrobeing. And these beings together with the macrobeing are then no longer on the physical plane.