Inner Truth: Develop Forbearance

Spiritual effort demands not only physical endurance and courage, but also unshrinking forbearance and unassailable moral courage. The world is caught up in Maya and is addicted to false values: therefore, the ways of the world run counter to the standard which the aspirant has set for himself/herself. If (s)he runs away from the world, that does not help the aspirant: (s)he will again have to come back to the world for developing that quality which would enable him/her to face and accept the world as it is.

Very often the Path lies through the world which the aspirant has to serve in spite of his/her not liking its way. If the aspirant is to love and serve the world which does not understand him/her or even is intolerant, the aspirant must develop infinite forbearance. As the aspirant advances on the Path, (s)he acquires, through his/her contact with the Master, an increasingly deeper understanding of true love; and this makes the aspirant painfully sensitive to those impacts from outside which not only do not taste of love, but actually bring him/her into contact with cold contempt, cynical callousness, agonising apathy and unabating hatred.

All these impacts try the aspirant's forbearance to the uttermost. Even the worldly man or woman suffers in the world which (s)he occasionally finds indifferent or hostile; but (s)he is thick skinned and his/her suffering is less acute, because the worldly person does not expect anything very much better from human nature and thinks that these things are inevitable and incurable. But, the aspirant who has tasted of a deeper love knows the hidden possibilities in every soul: and the aspirant's suffering is very acute because (s)he feels the gulf between that which is and that which might have been if only the world had even faintly appreciated the love which the aspirant has begun to understand and cherish.

The task of forbearance would be easy if the aspirant could get reconciled to the ways of the world and accept them without challenge. But, having seen the higher, it becomes an imperative duty of the aspirant to stand by it, even if the whole world opposes him/her.Loyalty to the higher truth of the aspirant's own perception demands unshakable moral courage and readiness to face the criticism, scorn and even hatred of those who have not yet begun to open out to the truth; and although in this uneven struggle, (s)he does get unfailing help from the Masters and other coaspirants, (s)he has to develop the capacity to fight for the truth single-handed, without relying upon external help all the time. This supreme moral courage can only come with supreme confidence in oneself and the Master. To love the world and serve it, in the ways of the Masters, is no game of the weak and the faint-hearted.

The author (1894 – 1969), was a mystic and spiritual master. For details mail to avatarmeherbababombaycentre@gmail.com

Have a spiritual message? Mail it to us at inbox@dnaindia.net in less than 250 words.