Inner separation is a technique that must be developed through practice. At the beginning, it is possible to say that we lack the power of inner separation simply because we do not know that this possibility exists and we say "I" to everything; we think that we are an only and permanent "I". We do not even understand that only through the exercise of inner separation can we have a new sense of "I". We live in a dream state and this means that not only do we consider ourselves as conscious people, who know at any moment what we think, feel, do or happen to us, but also as unique and solid I´s. We use the word "I" in everything we do or we say, attributing everything to ourselves as if we were the doers. This is what it means when the work says that we are in a dream state. We are asleep because we do not know who we are and because we imagine being what we are not.

    The first step in the work of awakening from this false identity is to understand, through impartial self-observation, that thoughts happen to us, that feelings and moods happen to us, that everything that we experience happens to us and that we continuously say "I" to all this. Thus, the first step towards inner freedom and individual evolution is to realize that everything happens to us and that we have no power over it.

    We will only be serving life's purpose and will not develop our full potential, unless we discover that we are not what we imagine to be and we stop attributing everything to ourselves. Inner separation takes us to a completely different state. We need to remember at any moment that our daily state is incorrect, that it is a total dream state and that this work tries to wake up us from this state. Everything happens to human beings. Everything occurs mechanically according to the circumstances and his typical mechanical reaction. We think that we are a permanent "I" and do not realize that it is the peculiar kind of acquired machinery which causes reactions to different impressions. Another kind of acquired machinery, under different conditions, in another country and another culture, would not react in the same way faced with the same impressions.

    We will continue taking everything we experience and all the mechanical reactions as if they were ourselves, unless there is no introspection. It is necessary to start off from being tired of ourselves as we are now, from the necessity to know our real face, to know ourselves.

    The way to work with all this is by means the exercise of inner separation. Unless you stop attributing everything to yourself, you will continue being identified and you will think that you are that. In this sense, "I" cannot fight against "I" because they are identical so a distance must be established. This work requires a growing and delicate inner perception. It is necessary to have the capacity to say: "I am not this". For example, when we say I to a thought, we are giving it entrance and thus it has power over us. We will act from this thought and there will be a mechanical result. There is no contamination with its entrance, but there is with the act that comes from it because we are not aware. We must create an inner space in us by the Work, separating us internally as the first step towards self-remembering.

    Thoughts come. Any kind of thought can enter a person. Some thoughts are useful and it is not necessary to separate from them. Thoughts fly towards us from all directions, but they are not ours. We make them ours when we say "I", when we put the feeling of "I" on them. When we think that they are ours and we do not realize that everything is mechanical, that we are asleep.

    When we perceive that thoughts come to us, that we can choose to get identified or not and when we perceive that we are in need of real will, that we are just the result of many changing and conflicting "I´s", then we begin to awaken from the dream. We lose the "life-idea" about ourselves, that false picture and something else appears, different from what we think we are. This is the beginning of what Ouspensky calls psycho-transformation.