Theos-Talk Archives (July 1996 Message tt00033)

Nicholas:

I'd generally agree with your comments.

When you say that we should try to develope a real love for
humanity, to try to become compassionate people, you're pointing
out an important practice, something as important as any reading
of the books.

My comments were directed at a later state, where the *trying* is
not there. Perhaps a better way would be to say that we're not
aware of a sense of *trying*, there's no notion of exertion or
"supposed to" or "trying to be". There is work; there is effort;
there is self-sacrifice -- it's just that the notion or
perception of "this is *me* having a hard time" disappears. The
awareness shifts to the beauty of the thing begin worked for,
rather than the aches and pains that we encounter along the way.

I'd also put a slightly different emphasis on the object of our
compassion. I find it more useful to consider compassion as
being for all of life, and not particularly limited to humanity.
As compassion changes from being an occasional guest to a
permanent resident of us, a permanent content of our
consciousness, I'd see the experience as an expression of the
holy, sacred, special nature that it carries.

The emphasis is upon "this wonderous thing seeking expression"
rather than upon "this suffering creature before me needing
assistance". We are aware of the suffering and it is as acute to
us as our own would be, but the awareness would be of the quality
of compassion and how it expresses it through us, rather than
upon "that other being, apart from myself, needing something that
I can give it". The whole experience of "I" and "thou" is
starting to fade.

Your other point regarding failure is also true. The biggest
failure is *giving up*, not in setbacks. And there are cyclic
periods of the ebbing of our theosophic awareness. The deciding
factor, then, is whether one's sincerity, enthusiasm for, and
dedication to the Path is ebbing, or is one as strongly burning to
lift the darkness of the world -- both within and without -- as
ever.