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A Treatise on White Magic - Rule Eight - Cyclic Ebb and Flow
The life of the aspirant begins to repeat earlier cycles. He is assailed by a sudden stimulation of the physical nature and violently swept by ancient desires and lusts. [245] This may be succeeded by a cycle wherein the physical body is conscious of the flowing away from it of vital energy and is devitalized, because not the subject of attention. This accounts for much of the sickness and lack of vitality of many of our most cherished servers. The same process can affect the emotional body, and periods of exaltation and of highest aspiration alternate with periods of the deepest depression and lack of interest. The flow may pass on to the mental body and produce a cycle of intense mental activity. Constant study, much thought, keen investigation and a steady intellectual urge will characterize the mind of the aspirant. To this may succeed a cycle wherein all study is distasteful, and the mind seems to lie entirely fallow and inert. It is an effort to think, and the futility of phases of thought assail the mind. The aspirant decides that to be is better far than to do. "Can these dry bones live?" he asks, and has no desire to see them revitalized. All true seekers after truth are conscious of this unstable experience and frequently regard it as a sin or as a condition to be strenuously fought. Then is the time to appreciate that "the midway spot which is neither dry nor wet must provide the standing place whereon his feet are set." This is a symbolic way of saying that he needs to realize two things: That states of feeling are quite immaterial and are no indication of the state of the soul. The aspirant must center himself in the soul consciousness, refuse to be influenced by the alternating conditions to which he seems subjected, and simply "stand in spiritual being" and then "having done all, stand." That the achievement of equilibrium is only possible where alternation has been the rule, and that the cyclic ebb and flow will continue just as long as the soul's [246] attention fluctuates between one or other aspect of the form and the true spiritual man. The ideal is to achieve such a condition of conscious control that at will a man may be focused in his soul consciousness or focused in his form aspect, - each act of focused attention being brought about through a realized and specific objective, necessitating such a focusing. Later when the words of the great Christian teacher have significance, he will be able to say "whether in the body or out of the body" is a matter of no moment. The act of service to be rendered will determine the point where the self is concentrated, but it will be the same self, whether freed temporarily from the form consciousness or immersed in the form in order to function in different aspects of the divine whole. The spiritual man seeks for the furthering of the plan and to identify himself with the divine mind in nature. Withdrawing to the midway spot, he endeavors to realize his divinity and then, having done so, he focuses himself in his mental form which puts him en rapport with the Universal Mind. He endures limitation so that thereby he may know and serve. He seeks to reach the hearts of men and to carry to them "inspiration" from the depths of the heart of spiritual being. Again he asserts the fact of his divinity and then, through a temporary identification with his body of sensory perception, of feeling, and of emotion, he finds himself at-one with the sensitive apparatus of divine manifestation which carries the love of God to all forms on the physical plane. Again he seeks to aid in the materializing of the divine plan on the physical plane. He knows that all forms are the product of energy rightly used and directed. With full knowledge of his divine Sonship and a potent mind realization of all that that term conveys, he focuses his forces in the vital body and becomes a focal point for the transmission of divine energy and hence a builder in [247] union with the building energies of the Cosmos. He carries the energy of illumined thought and sanctified desire down into the body of ether, and so works with intelligent devotion.
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