A Battle One Can
Win Minute By Minute
Carlos Cardoso
Aveline

Wisdom in daily life means an inner
harmony with the laws of nature
A profound harmlessness - not a smiling
show of it for the others to see - is a central tenet in esoteric philosophy.
Non-violence and
harmlessness result from an impersonal harmony with the Laws of Nature in one’s
daily life. They safely protect the lower self of the student from a number of
mistakes. For his own good, an aspirant to discipleship must be thoroughly
harmless at the conscious and subconscious levels of his personal intentions.
It does not
matter much whether his actions will be interpreted as “harmful” by those who
are misguided. What the others will say is not his priority: his own honest
self-examination, and his thorough willingness to face Karma as he tries his
best, are the decisive factors.
While
harmlessness must be present in one’s words and deeds as long as one refers to
and relates to persons, it also happens to be the formal Duty of theosophists
before the law of Karma to defend their sacred sources of inspiration from
unjust attacks, and exercise sincerity.
Being called
unbrotherly and arrogant for doing that is a natural thing to occur. It is OK to be attacked in many and varied
ways. All of this helps the student make a sustainable progress along the path.
Being unjustly accused is a valuable form of training in “personal
unimportance”. Self-forgetfulness is of
the essence in esoteric philosophy. Transcending
one’s lower self is the basis of real harmlessness.
Nonviolent
people who are active in working for a noble task must remain personally
harmless under all circumstances. They must keep a door open for their
adversaries’ redemption from error and towards true sincerity. A theosophist
may be severe and even hard on a philosophical plane, and this is more than
enough.
Impartial
justice sounds like cruelty to the ears of those who have lost the sense of
impersonal ethics. What to do then regarding those who get sincerely offended -
if not aggressive - any time one tells them the truth?
Only a deep
personal harmlessness, and a profound, impersonal sense of justice, entitle the
pilgrim to develop actions which he knows will be easily misinterpreted as “arrogant”
and “unbrotherly” by the many. A degree of courage will be useful, too. History shows that being unjustly attacked is
the price to pay for helping the Masters’ project regarding mankind.
Examples of that
are given by the lives of Helena Blavatsky, John Garrigues, Paracelsus,
Giordano Bruno, Alessandro Cagliostro - or Mohandas Gandhi. In the ancient
world, Socrates, Seneca, Hypatia, and hundreds of others.
The history of
every country produces such heroes, most of whom remain anonymous and unknown.
Every student of theosophy can follow the uphill path of the heart in his or
her own way: inner truth prevails and shines out in time. There must be no
hurry about that. Acting in the best way one can is an hourly battle: it brings
about a daily victory which one can win minute after minute, year after year,
across the decades.
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An initial
version of the above text was published in the July 2013 edition of “The
Aquarian Theosophist”, pp. 10-11. It had no indication as to the name of the
author.
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On 14 September 2016, after examining the
state of the esoteric movement worldwide, a group of students decided to found
the Independent Lodge of Theosophists.
Two of the priorities adopted by the ILT
are learning from the past and building a better future.
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