Street-Level Teachings - Esoteric Hopes
There's a lot of street-level teaching about spiritual things.
People are being offered all kinds of esoteric hopes. People come from other parts of the world and they suggest to very ordinary people that they will give them the secret, ultimate esoteric practice that only Swami Radhatat practiced.
He said it was the right and only one for all living beings. And you can learn it very briefly or all you have to do is come at the appointed hour and Master Supersmack [LAUGHTER] will touch you with a cup of margarine and you will see the nectarous sublimity of the blue person.
And sometimes the motives of such people are not merely negative, they are just unillumined.
They suggest to ordinary people that you can bypass the fire and enter into the light but you cannot bypass the fire and there is no way into the light except through surrender of self, ecstasy, love in the form of all of your acts, in the form of every moment of life.
There is no other way and all the esotericisms appear in the midst of that way as a moment of responsibility which itself must be transcended.
So there is no cheap super-truth for the masses to suit our technological and scientific times, you see.
Difficult Now As It Ever Was
It is as difficult now as it ever was and the requirements are what they have always been. And the advantage that may be brought to you in the midst of that way of life is the same ancient one and there is no easy way to do it.
It is very difficult.
It is a manly way of life. It is a creative way of life in the highest sense in that it involves self-transcendence rather than self-fulfillment. Not conventional creativity which is essentially self-fulfillment, self-glorification, self-expansion.
And it is true that there are esoteric meditative practices and they will become your responsibility from time to time when it's appropriate….
And it is also true that in the company of the spiritual master through the contact of the spiritual master this process can be quickened and the current of the body-mind can be intensified in your experience and various kinds of phenomena of an extraordinary kind can be made to appear.
But all such things, you see, have anciently been given to devotees. People off the street were not given the higher esoteric instruction. People without discipline or devotion were not welcomed into the casual society of the adept.
Preparation & Maturity
People were obliged to prepare themselves and to live the way truly and their illusions were not reinforced by a lot of nonsense and promising.
The real way was obliged on them and at right moments in their maturity what was esoteric was given to them. What was powerful was brought into association with them.
So in our way there are esoteric practices and there is a spiritual influence that may be brought to you directly. But none of that is something to be casually approached and there are laws for association with such things and there is a maturity that is necessary and there is an essential practice or disposition that is the foundation of the whole way.
No Light Without Fire
So the teaching of truth as it can be communicated broadly, you see, must carry this sober estimation of the way and there is no light, no enlightenment without fire, purification, self-transcendence. That's the law.
The light is given to you but through or in the face of your surrender.
Therefore in your earliest stages of the living of the way the fire is prominent and there is a great deal to learn and there is a lot of growth yet to be gone through…just to be human.
So our commitment must not be to our enlightenment but to the light, to God.
And that commitment is exercised through surrender.
Love Communion in every moment and every form of your activity must be considered.
What is not auspicious, rejected, what is ordinary and acceptable in the life of a devotee must be practiced as love communion. Diet must be practiced as such. Sexuality must be practiced as such. Your daily life must be practiced as such.
And your devotional exercise must be truly that then, you see.
