Victory Occurs in
Silence
And Results from Mutual
Help
Carlos Cardoso Aveline
Carlos Cardoso Aveline
The feelings of
friendship and good will among fellow truth-seekers are sacred - just as they
are among all beings.
The inner reality of affinity must be protected from any
use of verbal adornments whose weight, if excessive, would destroy the energy
of communion.
The nurturing of brotherhood must occur more in
silence than in words. Generous emotions deserve due respect and must be observed
with a degree of impersonal severity, lest they come from one’s lower self.
Avoiding an irrational flourishing of personal
eagerness prevents moments of despondency. Unnecessary avidity produces
needless moments of discouragement. A lasting enthusiasm is nurtured by
moderation.
The act of searching for truth is quite different from
looking for information.
One can look for information and accumulate a vast
amount of data without ever renouncing misleading views and false assumptions.
In order to look for truth, one must be able to make
decisions regarding true and wrong. One has to give up attachment to whatever
previous information one may have, if it turns out to be wrong. As we make
progress towards truth, we get away from illusion, which is seldom too easy to
do.
Insignificance as a Blessing
Accepting personal meaninglessness is as important in
theosophy as the courage and ability to correctly challenge organized ignorance.
The acknowledgement of personal irrelevance can be
obtained after one realizes that there is nothing really meaningless about
life. One must never automatically reject something that appears to be an
unimportant task or duty, a void moment, a tasteless obligation or boring
activity. Because it is not: there are
always lessons in everything.
However, one must be happy to be seen as an irrelevant
individual. Humbleness paves the way to freedom and detachment. The simple mind
renounces every unnecessary form of sophistication, thus transferring its focus
to the higher self. As to the brilliance of spiritual soul, it is externally
invisible, silent, and largely unperceived.
The Grand Rule of Learning
To renounce personal expectations as to
results of actions is not the same as being thoughtless regarding the
consequences of one’s efforts. Far from that. While not acting for selfish ends,
the student of true philosophy must be most careful of what he does.
The grand rule of occult learning is that
as long as one learns, one faces ever-renewed, unexpected tests. The learning
takes several lifetimes. One must have a long-term plan of action.
Self-regulation is a decisive science in life; and so is full attention, in
order to discern right from wrong as much as one can.
000
An
initial version of the above article was published with no indication as to the
name of the author in the December 2015 edition of “The Aquarian Theosophist”, pp. 9-10. Original title: “The Gradual
Process of Victory”.
000
