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Esoteric Psychology II - Chapter II - The Ray of Personality - Problems of Disciples and Mystics
4. Detachment. This is one of the major psychological difficulties which leads to the common phenomenon of cleavage. It is one of the hardest to handle. The mystic who can see naught but his vision, who registers that vision in terms only of symbolic forms, of sexual longing, of agonizing aspirations and an intense "wish-life" of dream and desire may eventually succeed in severing all right relations both within himself (with his physical body in one place, his emotional life directed to another and his mind preoccupied elsewhere) and with his surroundings and environing responsibilities, so that he lives entirely in a world of his own manufacturing - detached, unmoved, and untouched by normal affairs or human calls. This is sometimes also brought about by an unrecognized desire to escape from responsibility, from the pain and irk-someness of daily living or from the clinging hands of those who love him; it can be brought over from another life of mystical experience which should, in this life, be permanently transcended and outgrown, having served its useful purpose and done a needed work. This is a detachment of the wrong kind. I realize as I give you this teaching upon the difficulties of the mystical life - devitalization, delusion, delirium and detachment - that those who have gained much from the mystics or those who are at this time mystically inclined will violently disagree. I would seek to make myself clear on these [605] points. The mystical way is the right way for people at a certain stage of evolution, the Atlantean stage, provided it is not carried to the point of insanity, hallucination, furious fanaticism and psychopathic complications. It is, rightly expressed, a useful and needed process whereby the astral body is reoriented and spiritual aspiration begins to take the place of desire. It is necessary to have vision for "where there is no vision, the people perish". True vision is, in reality, the astral reflection of the divine Plan, reflected into the higher levels of the astral consciousness of the planet and there contacted and sensed by those human beings whose focus in life is of a very high grade nature, whose "intention is towards God and righteousness" but who are introverted at this time, who lack much technical knowledge either of divine law or of the constitution of man or of the planetary life, and whose minds are quiescent and non-questioning except in an emotional sense and for the relief of the mystic's own spiritual distress and desire for peace and satisfaction. There is, for instance, little in the writings of the mystics of the middle ages, (either in the East or in the West) which gives any indication of a sense of world need or of humanity's demand for enlightenment. The astral reflection of the Plan - such is the vision. There the life forces of the mystical physical nature, of his astral body and of his soul (two forces and one energy) unite and there they produce a powerful expression of focused desire, deep inchoate longing, vivid imagination and the construction of a thought form, expressing all that the mystic desires to contact or to see expressed. There will be, as time goes on, less and less of this mystical approach. The work of realizing beauty and the instinct to reach out towards divinity are now so deeply rooted in the racial consciousness that the balancing work of the mind and the presentation of the Plan in the place of the Vision can [606] safely proceed. The children of the race who are still Atlantean in consciousness will continue with the mystical approach and the beauty of that contribution will still be the heritage of the race. But the cycle of the mystical effort and experience will be considerably shortened and scientifically controlled because its purpose, its place in racial unfoldment and its contribution to the "doctrine of Reality" will be better understood. This mystical cycle is the correspondence to the "adolescent" cycle in the life of the young, valuable, visionary and life-giving, spurring on to right orientation and stabilizing certain standards and values. Such a cycle will, however, be recognized as undesirable when the time has come that a new and higher set of values and a more spiritual and controlled technique should take its place. A life purpose, a recognized plan and a correctly directed activity must eventually supersede all adolescent yearnings, dreams, imaginative longings and aspiration in the life of the individual and of the race. Mistake Me Not. The vision is a vision of reality. The Eternal Dreamer dreams and the greatest of all Mystics is the divine Logos Himself. But His dream must be registered in our consciousness as God's Plan and the mystical vision is the necessary though passing development in the human being of the "dreaming" aspect of God's Nature. Ponder on this, for it holds revelation to those who ponder rightly.
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