Theo. – What matters most, according to you, to be a good meditator?
The Elder – Zeal, enthusiasm!
Theo. – Is it why you’d rather call a meditator an aspirant, instead of a practiser?
The Elder – Practice, thanks to cleaning and transmission, is extremely effective, but the goal remains to conquer.
Theo. – As regards oneself, particularly. Furthermore, I have noticed that the meditators that inspire me most are also successful in their lives, at both professional and family levels. They launch on their quest not for the lack of something but…
The Elder (interrupting):
– Every soul will aspire to the same, to returning to God. Don’t prejudge through external criteria. You wanted a significant criterion? Here is one: compassion. For some people, the destiny their souls have chosen is not an easy one. Most often, it is only because they want to reach the goal rapidly.
Theo. – But the route they choose may be an extremely difficult one, too, let alone insuperable…
The Elder – A Master of Wisdom will know that and his aspirants will be provided all the help required. Sometimes, liberation and realization happen suddenly, they come unexpected, and they may even come many years later, and even after many lifetimes spent toiling, which earns our deepest respect.
Theo. – I guess it does! You are right.
The Elder – Love cares little for our criteria. It cares more for open hearts and that is what we are working on. No yogic technique will ever be able to achieve that. Love responds to Love.
Theo. – But we can still help, can’t we?
The Elder – By cleaning samskaras, we weaken the load our brothers and sisters have to bear and we give them access to a greater consciousness and clear-sightedness. For example, cleaning Point 1 will free the aspirants of their compulsive desires and kindle a true feeling of love in them.
Theo. – Sure, but a systematic fun-seeking attitude will often hide something else, a feeling of dissatisfaction for instance.
The Elder – Actually, it shows the person feels there is a void to be filled, a bottomless pit that brings about only few sustainable satisfactions and an ensured imbalance. Many persons live their lives with difficulty. They endure their lives. Masters of Wisdom and Love will notice and help, they will root it out and contribute to freeing them from the cause of all their sufferings.
Theo. – They are rather determined there…
The Elder – Their will is powerful. It is the very sort of will that helped them reach God and be absorbed into Him. So, when they dedicate such a will to their mission, they can be very efficient, but they will never make it binding. They will never go against what the persons really want. They accept and love the whole of them. And if the persons ask for it, they will accompany them all along their lives and even beyond.
Theo. – How to know who is sitting opposite me?
The Elder – Through transmission: transmission will make your spirit know who that person is.
Theo. – I thought transmission was neutral!
The Elder – It is, but it will lend force to whatever is in contact with it. It will feed it and make it grow.
Theo. – I see. That is the reason why we should use it only on a heart that has been purified first.
The Elder – We clean the whole region of the heart. Babuji used to say that it covers the being from head to toe.
Theo. – Transmission is used mainly for revealing God within us, isn’t it?
The Elder – It does it perfectly well. Transmission is food for the soul. After having pondered over that for some time,
Theo said:
– In the same way, I’d think that if I want to be a good trainer, I will have to work still harder at meditating and become a real aspiring aspirant, a sincere disciple, in order to do a good training job.
The Elder – That is well considered! The biggest part of your job consists in using the cleaning process to make the aspirant ready to attain a high degree of purification.
Theo. – So far, I used to see yatra as a progress through the various chakras, particularly the top five chakras of the heart…
The Elder – … which are in connection with the five elements, in the perspective of the liberation and realization of the soul. All is well, so far.
Theo. – Except that what you taught me about resonance gives a very different perspective. Purifying, getting purified to make the best use of transmission, I agree, but that is primarily for the aspirant to have a perfectly pure heart, the one condition to see the Lord reside there permanently.
The Elder – Only the force of Love can achieve this. At such a blessed moment, grace will directly pour down into the meditator’s heart and there won’t be any more limits any longer. The Goal, the Centre will be there.
Theo. – In fact, it had always been there, but we didn’t know.
The Elder –Practice and attendance make us become aware of it. That is the jnana-yoga (yoga of knowledge) in the raja-yoga system.
Theo. – I can better understand now why Daaji tells us that our work on points A and B is not a mere purification of the vasanas (desires), since that purification will also provide access to a super-consciousness as well as to the brighter world (where liberated souls reside).
The Elder – There, the trainer’s Inner Master is the one who must do the work.
Theo. – Otherwise, we would achieve a very poor result indeed!
The Elder – Yet the trainer contributes to liberating the inner master in the meditator’s heart.
Theo. – I realize that Love alone can achieve that.
The Elder – That is why Sahaj Marg (the Natural Way) is a way through the heart.
Theo. – How to trigger off love in the aspirant?
The Elder – That is a mystery.
Theo. – Okay, but…
The Elder – Just become love yourself; become what you suggest the meditator should become.
Theo. (at once amused and serious):
– The meditator, poor soul, had better worry about it then!
The Elder – That is the reason why we advocate self-effacement.
Theo. – Notably for the trainer, I think…
The Elder – Some time ago, in France, certain trainers thought that the yogic energy that was manifested would make them important. Convinced that it came from the trainers, people would then idealize the trainers. That was a big mistake!
Theo. – As you said the other day, a good trainer is a dead one.
The Elder –He/She is completely dead to self, for sure, and present to God within him/her, within the others, as well as everywhere. This is the blessed state of laya-avastha (dissolution), a state that helps liberate the flow and helps the Master go on freely with his work. Then you are privileged to witness such a wonder. Comparatively, the results the trainer’s self, the ego (ahankara) may obtain are paltry ones. When you are aware of it, you want only that state. It may even become painful if ever your ego starts kicking in, so that the inner master has to wait patiently until it retreats to make room for the Divine. The state of laya-avastha (dissolution) is a real birth. The resonance starts in the heart, which contains everything. The heart of the heart of the heart is the very essence of God. We just have to let it emerge. We must make room for Him.
Theo. – And then, love will do the work masterfully…
The Elder – … and then, anything can happen.
Theo. – As for us, we just have to thank the Lord.
Theophile the Elder
An excerpt from Dialogs with Theophile the Elder
Theophile the Younger’s Initiation