Included in the hard copy version were these flyers:
Dear Friends
As I put “pen to paper” after being in- spired with the writings of Helena Roerich’s On Eastern Crossroads, I realize that we are just one week away from participating in WMEA’s annual Living Ethics convention. As you read this letter, however, we will have already enjoyed the experience, having renewed ourselves with a deeper inspiration and understanding of the sacred Teachings of Agni Yoga.
Most of the time when dedicated students come away from a spiritually charged conference, they leave with thunderbolts of enthusiasm to change their lives, to live better lives, and to establish splendid goals to conquer the world of form. Yet later, as the weeks and months go by, oftentimes they find themselves settling back into old habits, into old patterns of thinking with feelings of futility, in random attempts to achieve their initial aspirations. If this occurs to you, always remember the path of transformation asks for action, discipline and balance in an atmosphere of joy.
If our enthusiasm takes us beyond our normal day-to-day level of consciousness, of beingness, then as soon as possible, we will need to make some practical and balanced life adjustments in order to manifest our newly experienced aspirations and enthusiasms. We must creatively use the energy that was collected during the conference, or collected from our experiences of meditation, study and reading. If we do not, the energy will become destructive and negative rather than creative and positive. It is like the proverb “Eating too much of a good thing leads to inertia. You must digest what you eat.”
It is important to remember the beauty of balance as you strive on the path of Self-perfectment, and in that remembrance, not to set unrealistic or non-specific goals. The path of Self-perfectment is the path of striving, the path of discipline; it is traveled step-by-step, day-by-day, and life after life in an atmosphere of joy and balance. It is also important to make sure that each step taken is a step toward self-improvement, a step that will lead to gradual transformation. Rarely will one step lead to instant illumination, and hastily taken steps will rarely take one to his intended destination. M. M. says, “Make haste slowly.”
There is a beautiful legend in the book On Eastern Crossroads
by Helena Roerich that says:
“People do not comprehend the foundation of the Teaching of the Blessed One—the
foundation is discipline.
“Spiritually and physically the monk of the community strove to remain on the path. The first years he endured a severe probation. He was forbidden to kill himself with ascetic practices. But he was ordained to lead the battle by the one origin of the spirit.
“Thus austerely did Buddha instruct His disciples.
“Verily they knew joy only in the spiritual battle. Hence are the thorns of the path spoken of.
“Only when the will of the disciple was engendered as a lion and the silvery rein of spirit held its glow over the feelings of the pupil, then only did the Lord cautiously open the curtain and assign a task.
“And gradually the pupil was initiated into the Mysteries of Knowledge.”1
Joleen Dianne DuBois
President
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1. On Eastern Crossroads, Helena Roerich, pp. 14–15. ©First edition 1930 by Frederick A. Stokes Company. Second edition 1992 © Agni Yoga Society, Inc.
We lend Our Ears to pure thoughts.
Thou wilt receive the knowledge and wilt
walk the pure path,
but beware of anger and of doubt.
If thou art conqueror,
thou wilt receive the light.
If thou falterest, the whirlwind
will obscure thy soul.
Perfect yourselves, my friends,
unwearyingly.
Deny not the Voice of the Spirit,
suppress only the earth-bound voices.
Be daring—I am with thee.
Leaves Of Morya’s Garden I, 1924, para. 25
The
three dimensions are demons’ chains—as someone has said. Truly, he who chained
the human consciousness with three dimensions was a veritable jailer. How could
it have been possible to conceal the other beautiful, higher dimension! In their
first questions children often strive beyond the boundaries of conventional
limitations. At no time did the ancient wisdom insist upon three dimensions.
Only with the gradual coarsening of humanity did this limitation take possession
of the mind. It is remarkable that when the lamps of the heart become extinct,
people begin to concern themselves with limitations. One can quote numerous
historical examples of this self-abasement. But the human consciousness prefers
to ignore the fundamentals of self-perfectment. Thus it attempts to conceal
the most precious possibilities. Fiery World I, 1933, para. 109
The Mother of the World appears as a symbol of the feminine Origin in the new epoch, and the masculine Origin voluntarily returns the treasure of the World to the feminine Origin. Amazons were the embodiment of the strength of the feminine Principle, and now it is necessary to show the aspect of spiritual perfection of woman. Leaves Of Morya’s Garden II, 1925, pp.74–75
It is time to do away with the imperfection of matter. For this the people must become conscious of the spirit; otherwise the general condition tends to reduce the individual possibilities to its own level, as the waves of the ocean preserve a common rhythm. Therefore, it is time to arouse the nations by sword or lightning, only to evoke the cry of the spirit. Leaves Of Morya’s Garden II, 1925, p. 73
Those who seek the yogi for instruction will not be equally meritorious. A yogi must understand who comes by accident; who may become a pupil; who may in the future become a pupil-teacher, perfecting himself through the coming ones. It is worse for those who approach the Yoga and then try to return to the old life. Verily, it is easier for the astral body to return into the clutches of the physical body than for him who has acquired even a grain of knowledge to return to the darkness of prejudice. Warn those who wish to know about Yoga. We cannot lead anyone into delusion. Agni Yoga, 1929, para. 203
The manifestation of depravity in the Subtle World impedes humanity from proceeding incessantly toward perfection. But the Subtle World is corrupted by the earthly world; therefore the healing must begin from the earthly world. Hence, the study of Yoga is not only for self-perfectment but for the improvement of the Subtle World. The yogi, consciously changing the state of his body, reaches the tension of the work of spirit. He not only shortens the respite between incarnations but immediately projects his thoughts toward useful actions. Thus, through incessant labor, he unites the isolated worlds and affirms the realization of all that exists. Agni Yoga, 1929, para. 226
Why is Earth in a state of illness? Because the rays of the planets cannot penetrate the contaminated aura. Into what will man be reduced if he ceases his intercourse with the supreme consciousness and sinks into the basest ignorance? From the Raj planet to the microcosm, the law is one. Losing the realization of the great worlds, people have wandered away from the understanding of perfection. The worlds have become for them a mad dream; and their self-perfectment has become an unnecessary and perilous pastime. Slaving for the daily wage, people hope only for the end of the way. Religions have frightened humanity by their verdicts and have bereft it of daring. A man who has succumbed blindly to the state religion is like a donkey who bears an unknown load. Can one accept a religion as a police order? Can one accept on faith the verdicts of strangers who receive fees for communing with heaven? ...Ready to alter the ways of communion, ready for achievement, ready for the condemnations of ignorance, the yogi bids humanity contemplate the causes of reincarnated existences. By this thought will the quality of labor and understanding be changed. Contemplating the possibilities inherent in people, who would not wish to dare valiantly? Is not the victor’s crown his who teaches courage to humanity? Otherwise the heads of people, like swine, will remain stuck to the refuse of Earth. Agni Yoga, 1929, para. 245
Agni Yoga and Life
A Sunday Talk
by Joleen D. Du Bois
Life is about education
and learning. Life on this planet is a school. Agni Yoga is a Teaching that
educates the soul and gives us direction so we can graduate from this earth
school into graduate school: the higher worlds. 
Throughout the Agni Yoga Teaching, you will find many instructions on how to graduate with honors. The keynote for graduation into the Supermundane life is Self-perfectment. Self-perfectment is light. The opposite of Self-perfectment is “self-indulgence.” Self-indulgence is darkness; Self-perfectment is Light. Man either creates or destroys.
We have one of two life-direction choices. One choice leads to a dead end—to self-indulgence. M. M. says, “One can so build one’s life that each day will, as it were, be the end.” 1
The second choice—which is the choice of Self-perfectment—is, of course, the choice of preference where a person can illumine his life in such a way that each hour will be a beginning. 2
This instruction in Agni Yoga reminds me of the question: “Is the glass half full or half empty?” The first choice of self-indulgence is to build one’s life where he sees the glass as half empty; the second choice is to live life in such a way that the glass is half full. You either approach your life destructively and negatively or creatively and constructively.
As you read the books of Agni Yoga, you discover that at the heart of this Teaching there is an emphasis upon fire and upon evolution. Fire is about the creative life; evolution is about Infinity.
Fire is Life. The Fire of Space is the source of all life in any form. The ancient writings instruct, “Fire is Creative.” Creative Fire permeates all Space. In some Teachings the Creative Fire is called Kriyashakti: the Life-giving divine Fire, in all forms of life.
When we draw from the Life-giving Fire in the Universe, we direct our consciousness to the path of Self-perfectment. It is the Flame in our heart that links us with the Creative Fire in Space, with the Heart of the Universe. This same Creative Fire is also located within our own nature, “as above, so below.”
We each have a Divine Spark, a seed of life. The Fiery Seed of Life is our spirit. It is indestructible because it is sacred. This is a very important point to remember. Your spirit is sacred and as such is indestructible. However, the radiation of the fiery seed changes depending on the growth of our consciousness, the expansion of our consciousness. The energy around the fiery seed is consciousness.
This fiery seed is sometimes called the human soul. The human soul has a purpose, which is perfectment. It is through Self-perfectment that the fiery seed will evolve.
The purpose of each incarnation is to evolve on the path of Self-perfectment.
We must each evolve, progress, and advance. As our consciousness expands, our fiery seed will evolve and strive toward infinity. The human soul, plus the vehicle with which it is identified, becomes the command post from which the soul operates. It is this identification that creates the tests and traps for the evolving human soul. It is from this command post that we construct our glamors, desires, illusions and vanities, building our life in such a way that each day will, as it were, be the end. After the soul constructs a glamor, a habit, a vanity, it believes that is who he is. It says, “I am that.” He becomes the glamor, he becomes the illusion, he becomes the vanity or the habit or prejudice or this and that.
However, by making a conscious decision to travel the path of Self-perfectment, and to illumine his life in such a way that each hour will be a beginning, the person creates an environment for his soul to evolve, to strive toward perfection, to strive toward graduation into the Supermundane life—the life of an Agni Yogi.
The Supermundane World is in the higher strata of the Universe; it is also within ourselves if we know how to contact this level of fire. All strata of the Universe are permeated with fire. The Subtle World is a world of fire, but this world reflects the earth and is a fire by friction. The Supermundane is the highest world of Creative Fire, electric fire.
If one wants to travel beyond this earthly plane of existence, beyond the school of pain and suffering, from tests and trials, we are told that it requires breaking through and transforming the identifications the soul has constructed. It requires dis-identification from one’s habits, old outworn beliefs and ideologies, from fanaticism, pride, and vanity. Until this “awakening” occurs, the soul will be trapped and each day will be, as it were, an end, for the soul loses his freedom by identifying with his not-self—with his maya, glamor and illusions.
To graduate to the Supermundane World you must go through solar fire, the fire of the spiritual Hierarchy. This means you must create an environment where the fiery seed of the human soul can make contact with the spiritual Hierarchy of Earth. What is the Hierarchy?
In the biblical sense, the “Ladder of Jacob” symbolizes the Hierarchy. Each fiery seed, each human soul is impregnated, imbued by a ray of the Hierarch, which gives the soul a “knowingness” about its life direction. When the soul makes contact with the Ray, he will have a yearning to change his life, to find his Teacher. He will search for the Mountain. The mountain in Agni Yoga is a symbol of the Teacher. When we reflect upon the Hierarchy, we think about the Brotherhood, about the Christ and his disciples. Agni Yoga calls the Hierarchy the “guiding hand.”
The task of the Teacher is “to give you indications within those limits which are permitted. He will uplift you, cleanse you of outworn habits. He will warn you against all kinds of treason, superstition and hypocrisy. He will test you openly and in secret. He may also say ‘Farewell, passer-by.’” 3 The Teaching says, “Friends, if you wish to approach Us, elect a Teacher on earth and place in Him your guidance .… Each one should have a Teacher on earth.” 4
When you make a contact with the Christ or Master in your heart, you may remember having a dream where you had attended an inner plane classroom, or you may remember being in an Ashram. You may recall speaking to someone, teaching someone, listening to a lecture. Such an experience will give you deep joy.
Striving toward Self-perfectment, creating an illumined environment for your soul to evolve, making a contact with the Hierarchy and the Teacher will give you a fiery inspiration to dedicate yourself in service to all you meet. “Let the greatest among you be the servant to all,” said Christ.
When we study Agni Yoga, we study life, beauty, culture and creativity. We study how to improve on the life, how to heal, how to love, how to build right human relations. Some religious and spiritual Teachings prepare you for death, but they don’t teach you how to “live.” Agni Yoga believes in the continuity of life, in the continuing life of the spirit. It teaches us how to release the spirit that is enslaved in its past.
We are striving to the future, building a new consciousness, building new viewpoints, building new bodies in which to strive into the future—to the Supermundane Worlds.
The Agni Yoga Teaching is the teaching of life applied to each necessity. It provides a solution to the daily problems. It does not teach self-indulgence; it inspires us toward Self-perfectment.
When you meet an Agni Yogi you will know it. This is a person of decision, of commitment, of responsibility, of integrity. You will not meet an Agni Yogi who says, “maybe yes or maybe no,” “perhaps it is this, perhaps it is that,” or “could be,” or “for the time being this is what I believe.” There is no indecisiveness found in an Agni Yogi. When an Agni Yogi says “yes,” he means it. When he says “no,” he really means it.
A person whose soul has become identified with a life of maya, glamor and illusion is a person who is indecisive. He will change his mind saying, “Yes” today and “No” tomorrow. Such a person has not yet gained control over his lower nature; the lower nature is controlling the soul.
To
strive on the path of Self-perfectment, to create a path of illumination for
your soul to follow, where “each hour will be a beginning,” you can begin with
these six aspects:
1. The aspect of self-exertion. This means in all that you do you will
strive to be real; you will strive to input the Self into all that you do. Each
action you take will be an action of illumination. Most people labor through
their glamors, illusions, self-interest, vanities, and so forth. They consciously
or unconsciously hurt others with their manipulations, their bias, their superiority
and impositions, and then at the end of the day, will say, “I have done my job
well.” Each day will be, as it were, the end. But for the life of an Agni Yogi,
each hour will be a new beginning, for he is striving to become a new beauty;
his actions are infusing new creativity, new ideas, new ideals into his labor,
creating new pathways for himself and his community.
2. The “hurry up” aspect. So many people in today’s society have the burden, the restriction, the concerns of time. They hurry here and there, from waking up and eating a quick bite to running out of the house to get to work “on time.” They do not have time for creative endeavor or to give quality work to their employers or co-workers. but for a hurried labor that leads to sloppiness, failure and extensive financial costs to the company and consumer.
As a person striving to “live” his or her life, we must make right and creative use of our time to inspire others with culture, with beauty, with a vitality that will uplift and inspire with creative energy. Nicholas Roerich said, “We are asking our friends each day to think, to pronounce and to apply the understandings of Beauty and Culture.” 5 He also said, “We are not dreamers at all, but workers for life, and our apostolate above all is content in that we are striving to say to the people, Remember Beauty. Do not exile its image from life, but also actively call others to this feast of joy!” 6 “In constant labor, we have no time for agitations. We construct. In positive affirmation and realization we aspire to make earthly life more sensitive and more beautiful.” 7
Every day needs to be a day of improvement. We cannot transform ourselves if we are always in a hurry. Those who are in a hurry may be trying to “get there in time,” but at the expense of improvement, culture, beauty, and Self-perfectment.
Each time you engage in a labor you are striving to manifest an aspect of your Self—this is striving toward Self-perfectment. Anything less than that you are building a life of slavery for your soul.
When you are preparing a lecture, your friend or family member wants you to hurry so you can go to the movies. What do you do? Do you throw something together, which you later call a “lecture on the Ageless Wisdom,” but instead it is simply a presentation of words written and presented without thought? If so, you are misusing your time and energy, and deceiving those who are going to attend your lecture.
When a disciple gives a lecture, he will take a whole day or longer to consider his one-hour talk. He will meditate on the subject; he will think of those who will be attending the talk and think about their needs and different levels of consciousness. He will think how he can deliver the talk in a way that the Teaching will heal someone’s heart, or inspire a depressed person. He will consider how he can bring joy into the atmosphere of his talk. He is not in a hurry; he is not going to “hurry up and get it done.” He will spend all the time he needs to perfect his talk. Each time he presents a lecture, or writes a paper, he will strive toward Self-perfectment, in all humility.
3. The third aspect of striving toward Self-perfectment in blazing a path of illumination for your soul to evolve will be to overcome the downward pull of the personality nature, the downward pull of the past.
Here is a simple example. Let’s say you are registered in an evening one-hour class that meets weekly at 7 o’clock. At 6 o’clock you say to yourself “You know, I’m not really feeling very good; I’m tired, I’ve had a long day, I’d like to go home and just lay on the couch and watch some TV!” If you give in to the manipulation of your lower mind you will call a classmate or the teacher and say, “I would really like to come to class tonight, but I just don’t feel very well.” The command station of your soul tells you, “It is just too much for me tonight to attend class, or to attend the full moon meditation service, or to attend the Sunday service,” and you escape.
You see what is happening? Your habits, glamors, and illusions are tricking you, causing you to put up resistances…. preventing you from Self-perfectment. It is really amazing at all the excuses the personality nature devises to prevent the fiery seed from daily and each hour striving toward Self-perfectment. Your glamor says, “I already know all about the subject of the lecture, or in the case of a group meditation your glamor says: “I already know how to meditate. I don’t have to meet with the group this month. Next time I’ll attend.” But of course this one time gives way to another and another. We have engaged in self-indulgence and the day has ended.
It is also interesting to see how one’s emotional nature puts up resistances. It will tell you, “You know, the person in that class really hurt you last week, so why should you go to a class and try to be better? He needs to be in that class, not me!” Maybe that person who hurt you last week was really trying to help you do things better, but because of the glamor of self-importance, of knowingness, you failed to hear with the ears of Self-perfectment, listening instead with the ears of self-indulgence. In so doing you construct another resistance that prevents the soul from advancing.
The mind too makes many kinds of resistances that keeps a person from striving on the path of Self-perfectment; for example, vanity. Vanity is a very sneaky thing the mind uses to keep us from progressing. We think we are too good to do this or that. The Teacher tells us to perform a job. “Often the Teacher finds himself in a very difficult relation with his pupil. The pupil promises to follow all the Commands of the Teacher, but no sooner is one received than immediately reasons are found to alter it.” 8 We will find reasons to alter the request of the Teacher, thinking that we know more, or are too evolved to perform such a tedious task and will either reject the job or do it without joy, without enthusiasm, and without a willingness to do our best.
At other times, we may engage in a task, but find that the Teacher does not recognize us with praise. In reaction we may, in turn, fall into self-pity, into self-indulgence. One can so build one’s life that each day will, as it were, be the end.
An Agni Yogi is very careful when his Teacher praises him, for if he is being praised, he knows he did not do his best. If the Teacher says, “It wasn’t bad, but you could have done a better job,” then you know that your Teacher is encouraging your striving on the path of Self-perfection.
Some people won’t do anything unless they know they will receive applause for their labor.
Here is a story I found which is so beautiful. “We are told that the most beautiful flowers unfold and bloom in the deserts, canyons, and gorges. No human being ever sees them; no human hand touches them, but they bloom their perfection and become the joy of Nature.” They become flowers in the symphony of life and the joy of the stars. This is Self-perfectment!
4. The fourth aspect is joy. All that you do you must strive to do in joy. When I walk into a department or grocery store, it is so sad to observe so many unhappy people working there. They don’t realize that if they would do their work in joy they would be promoted. In joy we increase our health. In joy we deepen our love. In joy we contact the Fire in Space and ignite the fiery seed of the creative life within us. In that awakening we cannot accept anything less than striving on the path of Self-perfectment. Even if we fail, we will find joy in the failure.
'Some people will say, “But I cannot live in joy, for there is no joy, no love in my life.”Then you must do something about it! Don’t say, “I am a victim of my choices.” Change your thinking, change your choices, start a little bit at a time. Just a little bit. Each morning say, “I am going to put a little joy into my life today.” Do any of you feed the birds that stop by your house for a visit in the morning? Try it. Feeding the birds will bring you joy. They will sing so many beautiful songs for you in appreciation. If you don’t have a bird feeder, make one—for that action can bring you joy. Why? You are doing something selflessly for another little spark of life.
These past few months we have been feeding two little chipmunks along with the birds at the Center. Every day I sat at the desk in my office and saw the little chipmunks scurry over to their special place where I had left seeds and nuts in a huge wooden planter. I quietly watched them fill up their pouches with the seeds and corn…. They were so happy. What joy!
Later you can do other things, bigger things, more challenging things that will give you joy. Pretty soon, you will find your life changing, eventually finding the Master in your Heart. You will find a new meaning to the word “Life.”
5. The fifth aspect that will lead you to Self-perfectment is faith. Faith can never be taken from you when you make contact with your Soul. When you contact the light, the love, the beauty within yourself, you will always have the resource of faith to lead you into the next day, the next year, the next life of unfolding Self-perfectment. When you make contact with the fire of love, the fire of beauty, the fire of light within your nature, you will always have faith in your future, in the Infinity of Life. You have tasted your future and will do all that you can do to manifest it; you understand your destiny and you are striving toward it, the destiny of Self-perfectment. You have faith in your divinity and the divinity of Hierarchy and the Supermundane worlds. Your faith will put you on the path of your Divine Self.
6. Beauty. The sixth aspect that will lead you to Self-perfectment is Beauty. As you strive toward perfection, as you strive to purify your life, you will find beauty in the flame of your heart. You cannot see beauty with your brain. Your brain may analyze the beauty in something, but only your heart can recognize true beauty. Beauty inspires you; beauty uplifts you; beauty heals. Beauty inspires one to strive toward the Supermundane life. When you see a most beautiful and amazing sunset, do you analyze it or do you feel the rays of beauty? When you listen to music of the masters, do you analyze the music or do you feel the power of its beauty?
We are really living in a most judgmental and negatively critical world today. We put ourselves in such states of glamor and illusion that even though we may never have studied and performed music, or may never have painted a masterpiece work of art, we still designate ourselves as the artist’s critic. We must see with the eyes of the heart, hear with the ears of the heart.
“As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he.”
There are many wondrous experiences in life awaiting us as souls. We must strive to find the path of Self-perfectment, and then dedicate ourselves to that path. We must find a way to release our fiery seed from its prison and help it to advance, to evolve. Let us strive on the Path of Self-perfectment with each hour being a new beginning.
*********************************
1 Excerpted from Fiery World, Volume I, para. 308.©1943,1969 Agni Yoga
Society, Inc.
2 Ibid.
3 Agni Yoga, para. 103.©1952 Agni Yoga Society, Inc.
4 Ibid.
5 Realm of Light, Nicholas Roerich, p. 21. ©1931 Roerich Museum Press
6 Himavat, Diary Leaves, Nicholas Roerich, p. 24. First published in
1946; printed by J. K. Sharma at the Allahabad Law Journal Press, published
by Kitabistahn, Allahabad.
7 Ibid, p. 25.
8 Agni Yoga, verse 278, 5th revised ed. ©1952, Agni Yoga Society, Inc.
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