Fasting is about aligning our will with the Will of God. During this time we are to bring ourselves to account, weigh our actions, develop a deeper and more consecrated spiritual life, and rid ourselves of our selfish and animal natures. You’ve heard the phrase “Many are called, but few are chosen,” but have you ever reflected on how the few are chosen? That is what this session will help us explore.

Our ultimate goal is transformation for the good pleasure of God. We want God to be pleased with what we have done with the precious life given to us and to daily through our prayers, meditation, and deeds, to show our gratitude for “rescuing us from the wretchedness of nothingness.” Through a humble posture of learning, we begin to understand that the ego causes us to challenge, deny, become apathetic and unhappy, or to just blatantly disobey the laws of God.

In the last few reflections, we have defined what the ego is, and have discussed the role of tests in subduing it. In this reflection, we will discuss the means by which the fitness of the soul can be realized. Did you know that everyone is tested? Did you know that the same test will return if you do not pass it? Did you know that the tests will get progressively harder each time?

We must first remember what the purpose of tests are. They are for the purpose of assessing our worthiness, exalting our stations, subduing our egos, and strengthening us; no one is exempt! Because our ego thinks it can survive without God, has tried to become partners with God, or thinks it knows better than God, the Creator sends us tests to humble us and to save our souls. These benevolent tests are to help us to remember that we are soul and to not get so attached to this earthly fleeting vanishing existence.

“Tests are a means by which a soul is measured as to its fitness and proven out by its own acts. God knows its fitness beforehand, and also its unpreparedness, but man, with an ego, would not believe himself unfit unless proof were given him. Consequently, his susceptibility to evil is proven to him when he falls into the tests, and the tests are continued until the soul realizes its own unfitness, then remorse and regret tend to root out the weakness.”(2)

Have you ever thought that remorse and regret were actually good things? That it is this realization of our errors that “roots out our weaknesses?” Because we are imperfect humans, we are as Baha’u’llah explained it, “prone to error,” we are therefore susceptible to making mistakes and errors. Tests help us to recognize the dust on the mirror of our hearts so that we will realize our condition and put energy into polishing our mirrors, and as a consequence become attracted to the light and capable of reflecting its radiance.

As stated in the Holy Quran, “Do men think when they say ‘We believe’ they shall be let alone and not be put to proof? (1) “

We all live by a set of beliefs. We say we believe. But, do our actions conform to our beliefs? When they don’t we experience cognitive dissonance, a discomfort that can cause anxiety or dis-ease until we rectify it. Either we change our beliefs, or we change our behavior so that our beliefs and actions are in sync. This discomfort when viewed from a humble posture of learning can lead to deep reflection where we realize this inconsistency or untruth in ourselves. At that point, those that are humble and sincere experience remorse and regret. This dissonance is resolved when we change our ways.

We know that we will be called to account for our final deeds, but few realize that we get quizzes and midterms along the way as a way of testing us continually. That is why our tests get progressively harder each time we fail. Spiritual tests continue until our spiritual weaknesses become strengths.

“The same test comes again in greater degree, until it is shown that a former weakness has become a strength, and the power to overcome evil has been established.”(3)

Tests provide us continuous feedback of our spiritual fitness, and if we are observant and repentant, we learn, change, and transform. Only those who make spiritual transformation a priority are “chosen.”

“In this day, everyone must be tested, as the time of the “chosen ones” to prove their worth is indeed very short. The day of attainment is drawing to a close for them. The “first fruits” must be ripened in spirit, mellowed in love, and consumed by their self-sacrifice and severance. None other are acceptable as first fruits, and all who fail to attain to the standard through the tests, are relegated to the “many who are called”.

“The more one is severed from the world, from desires, from human affairs, and conditions, the more impervious does one become to the tests of God.” (3)

Maybe, the greater the ego is, the greater the tests? We were created to reflect the light of God and our egos prevent us from receiving our portion of Divine light. Let us thank God for the tests that are sent to us that allow our true light to shine.

“Today, humanity is bowed down with trouble, sorrow and grief, no one escapes; the world is wet with tears; but, thank God, the remedy is at our doors. Let us turn our hearts away from the world of matter and live in the spiritual world! It alone can give us freedom! If we are hemmed in by difficulties we have only to call upon God, and by His great Mercy we shall be helped.” (5)

Walking the spiritual path together

Your study partner, Barbara

1. (Abdu’l-Baha, The Secret of Divine Civilization, p. 26)

2. (SOW – Star of the West, Star of the West – 4)

3. IBID

4. IBID

5. Paris Talks

Parents have always been cautious in watching their children pick their friends. Why, because people are contagious and if we are not careful, we can become like those we hang around most. We want to make sure that our closest confidants won’t encourage us to get in trouble and are of good character. The ego is like a very close, but very bad friend. In the last message, we talked about the ego and how we must subdue it if we want God’s grace. Our true essence is soul and not body. Both require education, but a different kind of education.

“Baha’i education will strongly emphasize, therefore, the true nature of man, as an immortal soul which has both the opportunity and the obligation of spiritual development. In accordance with his dual nature, man’s selfhood or “ego” can become either degenerate or regenerate. Either we are constantly advancing on the spiritual path, or we are daily retrogressing. Even to remain inactive is to decay. (1)

Pause, “to be inactive is to decay”? Perhaps that is why we are taught that death is better than to spend our lives only on our “sensual desires,” especially when we have been singled out with so great an honor to be humans with a soul and endowed with the attributes of God.

“…If the health and welfare of man be spent in sensual desires, in a life on the animal plane, and in devilish pursuits — then disease is better than such health; nay, death itself is preferable to such a life. If thou art desirous of health, wish thou health for serving the Kingdom.”(2)

It requires a bit of humility to realize that we need help in subduing the ego. We have Abdu’l-Baha as our example:

“…One must be able with the spiritual eyes to see the things of the spirit. If we are like Him we must realize that we are nothing and that God is all – must eliminate the ego – surrender the self – and allow God to do His work in us instead of imagining that we have any power to accomplish it within ourselves.”(3)

We needn’t fear the powerful ego because through prayer, living the life, obedience to the commands of God and submission to His Will, we can subdue it! My sister used to say, “We need to stay prayed up!” I agree that it is through prayer that we get our power to soar and be protected against violent tests.

“We must pray night and day to endure unto the end and be protected from the shock of tests and trials. Prayer is the wing whereby the soul of man soars upward to the heaven of nearness.”(4)

BELOW, PLEASE FIND SEVERAL REFERENCES TO THE EGO TO REFLECT UPON DURING YOUR MEDITATIONS:

1. “Man’s selfhood or “ego” can become either degenerate or regenerate.
2. Either we are constantly advancing on the spiritual path, or we are daily retrogressing.
3. Even to remain inactive is to decay.” (1)
4. “Self and ego,” he said, “were like a cage, a prison. A man may be outwardly prosperous, but if he does not save himself from egotism, he is degraded and debased; while outside of the prison of self he is free, though (bodily) he might be in the greatest prison.” (5)
5. “The ego is the animal in us, the heritage of the flesh which is full of selfish desires.” (6)
6. “This lower nature in man is symbolized as Satan — the evil ego within us, not an evil personality outside. (7)”
7. Asked, “What is Satan?” He replied: “The insistent self.”
8. “The other self is the ego, the dark, animalistic heritage each one of us has,
9. The lower nature that can develop into a monster of selfishness, brutality, lust and so on. It is this self we must struggle against, or this side of our natures, in order to strengthen and free the spirit within us and help it to attain perfection.”(8)
10. “Intelligence, as it appears, is but an instrument of the ego by which it succeeds in achieving its desires, and as such can make no guarantee of continuity or stability to human progress.”(9)
11. Envy, jealousy, hatred, ambition — all the demoniacal forces which the ego of man can give rise to … have raised, in the hearts of more than one person, their ugly heads.” (10)

Walking the spiritual path together as we subdue our egos

Barbara Talley 2019,2021, 2022

SOURCES

The Fast is also known as the season of self restraint. We have learned that tests are necessary for our growth as spiritual beings. We have also reflected on the promise that we are destined to receive a greater portion of Divine Bounty during these days of the Fast. Well, it seems that there is a condition for receiving that bounty, and that is allowing our ego to veil us from receiving.

“For, no veil is greater than egotism and no matter how thin that covering may be, yet it will finally veil man entirely and prevent him from receiving a portion from the eternal bounty. (1)”

“For man, by his constitution, has an ego, a lower self within… The quelling of this ego is indeed the essential task that confronts the aspiring soul.” (2)

Tests have a vital purpose, for they remove “the rust of egotism from the mirror of the heart until the Sun of Truth may shine therein. (3) ”

‘Abdu’l-Baha calls the ego by different names, the insistent self, Satan, the animal within us, and the lower nature. He warns that,

“The love of self, which if directed to the ego will deprive man of all true development, but if the love of self is a realization that one is a creature of God and must therefore attain to the station appointed for him, this love will be an uplifting one.” (4)

We were created noble! The ego abases us and is one of the sources of our shame.

“Our sense of shame is because the nobler element within us, the divinely bestowed reality, is fully aware of the surrender of the conscious ego to inferior and wholly mortal snares.” (5)

“Attachment to the self includes attachment
1) to ideas which are “mine”,
2) to the ego which can be bruised,
3) to the desire for one’s own wishes to be accepted.” (6)

We all want clarity and certitude; fortunately, “A mind freed from personal ambition and detached from the ego, can see more clearly.” (7)

We have also learned that we cannot afford to become hopeless. So, what can we do? The All-Merciful Creator, through His Manifestation, has shown us four specific things we can do to subdue the powerful ego:

1) “By OBEYING the laws of God,

2) SEEKING to LIVE THE LIFE laid down in our teachings, and

3) PRAYER and

4) STRUGGLE, we can subdue our egos.

We call people ‘Saints’ who have achieved the highest degree of mastery over their ego.”(8)

Walking the spiritual path together as we subdue our egos

Barbara Talley 2019,2021, 2022