Efforts Without Effort
One of the most difficult binaries a Magus must neutralize, in order to ensure the highest efficiency of his development, is the binary of battle/game, whose integral expression is the notion of the magical Hunt.
On the one hand, the Magus understands with perfect clarity that he lives in a world saturated with consumption, and that his task is to break out of this vicious circle.
On the other hand, it is equally evident to him that, by its “design” — potentially — the world, as the embodiment of the Great Spirit’s intention toward self-knowledge, is perfect, and its corruption is merely layered, encrusted upon it.
Accordingly, the Magus, on the one hand, must treat the battle for the right to be oneself with complete seriousness, as an ultimate reality; yet on the other, he must understand just as clearly that no one has ever been able — nor will ever be able — to take this right away from him. Hence, the world’s rotation is only a game, an illusion.
Accordingly, the Magus must be mercilessly taut and attuned to harsh combat, and at the same time — utterly relaxed and, in the Daoist sense, “non-doing.”
An incredible number of destructors are layered upon this binary, and the mind almost inevitably slides to one pole or the other. But until the Magus learns to hold this balance, his efforts will either be spent in vain, or he will be carried away by the contemplation of potential light.
The Magus must understand that, on the one hand, all changes — all development — occur “of themselves,” as water naturally flows along its channel. Since the task of the cosmos is the Absolute’s self-knowledge, no one and nothing can impede this process. At the same time, the Magus must see with precision that the riverbed of the mind is usually heavily polluted and dammed by all manner of obstacles that hinder the normal flow of Power. And yet the source of this river lies somewhere in potential reality (all sacred rivers, according to myth, begin in the heavens and only then descend to the earth), and in order for this source not to run dry, constant and active efforts are required to receive it.
From the standpoint of the Myth we are describing, the world is, above all, a field of possibilities awaiting realization. It is precisely in the continual detection and neutralization of ever-new binaries that the Way lies toward the differentiation of ever-new potencies of the Great Spirit, and thus the Way toward His self-knowledge. Accordingly, an effective knowing mind, as an aspect of the Great Spirit, must incessantly deepen and broaden the spectrum of elements accessible to it, seeing in each of them a possibility of realization — that is, a duality that gives rise to a difference of potentials, and consequently to movement: actualization.
We have already said that, from the standpoint of the Magus’s Way, the traveler’s efforts must be directed, first of all, toward cleansing his mind of destructors, and then — toward the search for potencies to be realized.
However, if the first component is relatively comprehensible, the second often presents difficulties. Many Magi attempt to realize everything indiscriminately — every inner attraction — and instead of realizing desires, they actively embody only whims and caprices. That is, they simply dissipate energy and feed predators. Others, by contrast, are so meticulously occupied with searching for “themselves” and for the “true desire” that they realize nothing at all, trample in place, or fall into blissful contemplation of potential perfection.
As it is said in a well-known Zen parable, “enlightenment is like the sunrise: it cannot be summoned by personal efforts, but personal efforts are needed so as not to sleep through that sunrise.”
The Magus builds his Way so as to be maximally alert, attentive, and honest with himself. Although his efforts are, in essence, efforts only to sustain a wakeful state of mind, this “only” demands such a colossal quantity of energy that one must conduct oneself impeccably at all times.
Thus it turns out that, on the one hand, in the life of a Magus everything happens “of itself,” while on the other hand — he fights, never lowering the sword, from the first crossing of the Veil of Keshet and until the very end of his life.
Pitfalls of the Middle Way
Adeptship and Enlightenment
The Magus’s Tension
Step by Step
Condensation of Mind
The Battle for Self-Identity
Absence of Resistance
Severing Obstacles
So, the more allowed borders and identified contradictions, the more effort is required to maintain purity? I was just thinking about this recently. It seems like I realized it, but then again you kind of slip back to the beginning and lose vigilance. You have to stretch your memory a bit and in key moments slow down your consciousness to think about the situation. It’s like in any practice, at first everything is slow and calm, you memorize movements, grasp meaning, so that later everything goes automatically. But repetition is the mother of teaching.
Finally, everything (that has occupied me lately) has finally fallen into place, and my intuitive guesses have been confirmed. Thank you.