Skip to main content

He makes our fall a means for greater rise

 Only awhile at first these heavenlier states,

These large wide-poised upliftings could endure.

The high and luminous tension breaks too soon,

The body’s stone stillness and the life’s hushed trance,

The breathless might and calm of silent mind;

Or slowly they fail as sets a golden day.

The restless nether members tire of peace;

A nostalgia of old little works and joys,

A need to call back small familiar selves,

To tread the accustomed and inferior way,

The need to rest in a natural pose of fall,

As a child who learns to walk can walk not long,

Replace the titan will for ever to climb,

On the heart’s altar dim the sacred fire.

An old pull of subconscious cords renews;

It draws the unwilling spirit from the heights,

Or a dull gravitation drags us down

To the blind driven inertia of our base.

This too the supreme Diplomat can use,

He makes our fall a means for greater rise.


Ashwapati's heavenly uplifted states on the higher planes of consciousness could not persist in the beginning. This being a common experience of those who are on the path of yoga, Sri Aurobindo describes them saying: The luminous pressure of greater wonderful experiences breaks too soon and we return to ordinary states of consciousness. The stone like restfulness of body, the trance of life and calm of silent mind, either suddenly or slowly fade like the going down of a golden sun. This usually occurs because our lower self or the personality is restless and soon its get tired of peace. Like the homesickness of old joys and pleasures, it feels like going back to its familiar self. The need walk along the accustomed inferior roads and rest in the normal pose of lower self. Like a small child who cannot walk all day long when he takes his first steps and feels the need to sit down, the fiery will to climb forever can not be sustained and the sacred fire in the heart gets dimmed.  The spirit enjoying its heights is pulled down from its peak states by our strong bonds to the subconscious, like the pull of gravity. The movements of subconscious pulls us down into base of our material self which is made of blind intert matter. However even this need to fall back from heights is made us of by that supreme ambassador or the Lord to serve his Will or purpose of evolution. He makes each fall of ours, a means for a greater rise and further progress.


Every fall in valley is a means for greater rise on the next peak. Source: Himalayas by Nicholas Roerich, 1947 in Public Domain


Mountain Tops of Initiation and Valleys of Glamor


"The disciple climbs the mountain, its five peaks illumined by the Sun and hiding the other two. From point to point he goes and the Way moves upward all the time—out of the dark into the light, from the jungle to the open space, from night to dawn. From point to point he moves and at each point he gets new revelation. Five are the mountain peaks, and as he mounts towards each peak he receives five times the light. Five to the five and so from five to five till five fives have brought him light. Ten lie ahead, but these concern him not as yet." What is meant here (to bring it down to the bare factual outline) is that there are five initiations ahead of the disciple, with two more ahead of the Master, making in all seven initiations, and that prior to each initiation—symbolically or factually speaking—there are five great revelations, making a total of twenty-five, with ten later to be registered by the Master.


...


Go forward, my brother, looking not behind but with your eyes fixed in steadfastness upon the Way of a world Server. It is a hard way, with many ups and downs, and many steep hills and valleys of shadow, but there is rest and shade in the valley and sunshine on the hills. These difficulties your Master knows, for He, too, has found the way hard, when He travelled it. In speaking thus, I refer not to myself; I am only your teacher and your friend.


...


And so, from stage to stage the disciple passes, going from light to light, from perception to perception, from force to energy, from personality focus to soul integration and, then, from soul to spirit, from form to life. He has explored all the avenues of knowledge; he has descended into the depths, into hell and into the valleys; he has climbed the mountain top of initiation and from there has swung out beyond space and time; he has lost all self-interest and is a focused point of thought in the mind of God. Can I say more than this? I think not, my brothers. And so I bring to an end this series of instructions and my responsibility in this connection is ended. Yours now begins."


- Discipleship in New Age I and II, Djwal Khul


Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Aphorisms as seed-thoughts

 Subsequent to our discussion on seed-thoughts, another great example of seed-thouht I think is an aphorism. The complete agni-yoga series of books by Roerichs are aphorisms of Ethical living (and give Ray 1 flavour of fiery will to the yoga of synthesis). Similarly the temple aphorisms of Francia A. La Due give a Ray 5 flavour of occult science to the works of H.P. Blavatsky and William Q. Judge. We quote those aphorims (as seed-thoughts) from temple teachings of Master H. (with his image):  "Days come and days go, but if thou watchest thou shalt see: THE LOAD thou hast laid on the heart of a friend will God transfer to thine own heart; heavy as it presses on the heart of thy friend, heavier will it press on thine own heart in the days to come. THE STONE thou hast cast from the path of the blind will smite the adder lying in wait for thee. THE WEIGHT thou hast clamped on the feet of another will drag thine own feet into Hadean desolation. THE SHELTER thou hast given the wayfa...

The Yoga of Synthesis Diary Leaves 4

 Album The Yoga of Synthesis  Dated 22 January 2025 The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali give us four stages of meditation and when applied on symbols we find: 1. First, as the form is pondered upon, the realisation begins to dawn that it is but a symbol of an inner reality. 2. Second, there is a recognition of the quality or nature of the form—its subjective energy, the quality of the force that seems to flow through it, the emotion that the symbol arouses. 3. Third, as we concentrate on considering the quality, we arrive next at the purpose, the motive, and the idea that the symbol has held concealed. 4. Fourth, in the final stage of identification, one becomes at one with the symbol; one shares its quality; one participates in its purpose, and through these stages one arrives at a unity with the creator of the form. When applied to the four symbols (of Helena Blavatsky, Sri Aurobindo and The Mother, Alice Bailey, and the category-theoretic model of Cause-Meaning/Quality-Effect), we...

A synthesis of Savitri and Theosophy - Painting No 9

 "A glamour from unreached transcendences Iridescent with the glory of the Unseen, A message from the unknown immortal Light Ablaze upon creation’s quivering edge, Dawn built her aura of magnificent hues And buried its seed of grandeur in the hours." An occult meditation with a theosophical perspective: In these lines, Sri Aurobindo renders a captivating mood of a magical Dawn. It has an allure of inaccessible supremacy and is glittering with Unseen glory. There appears to be a message from an eternal Light, on fire upon a shivering rim. A splendid atmosphere with glorious tones seems as if the Dawn has planted its seed of splendour that will sprout in hours into a majestic day. The painting attempts to reproduce that magical Dawn. As stated previously, a Dawn might refer to any general beginning, an illustration in theosophy being a manvantara (manu/Ray 1 + anatara/gap or distance) generally valid from a microcosm (atomic life) to a macrocosm (man, planet, solar system and s...