Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law.

In the process of initiation are many obstacles. They are most of the time a combination of matters depending on the ‘soul maturity’ of the aspirant. They are personal but there are also many common obstacles that I observed in the training of  students over the years.

My old tutor once wrote:

“(1) To act as a barrier between the world of spiritually ignorant awareness and the worldof higher understanding. That is, ignorance and understanding about the true nature of reality. The barrier that awakens is designed to keep immature souls (those not ready toaccept higher understanding), out of the realm of higher awareness”.

There are so to speak ‘natural’ barriers that prevent the student from advancing. One of them is to fail to see the nature of ‘reality’ (higher consciousness). This realty is beyond the conditioned way we see things as an individual and as part of the ‘herd’. Mainly by upbringing, education, and self-developed thinking patterns, social context. The process of initiation supposed to break down this barriers. And only than one is able to overcome them.

And:

“(2) To force anyone who is mature enough (soul-wise) to learn about what reality reallyis, before allowing the barrier to fully open for them. It is not the intention of nature toallow anyone to gain higher awareness without understanding (i.e. an education abouthow reality works.)

‘Understanding’ is a very important factor. If one ‘understands’ its easier to work on ones hang-ups. However by many of the aspirants they aren’t aware of their own condition that prevent them from understanding.

And:

‘On the path of initiation (higher personal development) a number of crises are reached,must be experienced, understood, and overcome, in order for the initiate to continueonward and upward. These crises are the physical manifestation (so to speak) of thebarrier … that which traditional occultism has called “The Threshold to the Mysteries”.

There are several minor crisis’s. One of them is ‘laziness’.  This means that the aspirant just ignore instructions, don’t do the work they should do, ignore details, postpone their work etc. Thinking they know ‘better’ etc. The guardian of the threshold feeds this as its does always. One should be aware of this in order to overcome this. And act upon it.

The second minor crisis is ‘distraction’. This means that the student is involved in many unimportant matters (not productive in order to advance on the Path), like endless watching TV, socializing without any substance, have a full agenda of non-essential appointments etc. It’s the tutor’s job to assist the aspirant to reveal those matters/ patterns and help the aspirant to weed those matters out.

The primary crisis is ‘commitment’.

He wrote:

‘ Unconditional commitment is characterized by a deliberate and systematic focus on twothings:

1) Avoiding all distractions to success.

(2) Working towards taking the safest, quickest and most productive path to the goal.The student who actively takes care to work in this way can readily be consideredcommitted to the path.’

Commitment to ones Work in relation with the minor crisis’s involved. Many aspirants are getting offended when the tutor mentions those and correct them. This can be a painful process. One should arrange one’s life in a very different manner then one is used to. Many can’t let that go. Especially when one does things in a certain way for many years.

After this there will be many obstacles that will come up in the process. It all has to do with the level of soul maturity and how the tutor can assist the student in this. Therefore experience is required for the tutor. When those matters are addressed in the right way then the door is open to experience ‘real’ initiation. Especially at the start of the Outer order grades.

Love is the law, love under will.