The Most Difficult Stage

In
the Great Process of the Way, body and mind are ecstatically
released or surrendered into Life, or the Fullness of Divine
Radiance. Thus, as the Process matures, the structures and
functions of the body-mind first awaken and then become a
sacrifice into their Source-Condition.

The most difficult stage is the one
of transition from Lawless, subhuman existence to the
responsible beginning of spiritual life. After that, the
whole affair is more creative and freely voluntary. Thus, in
the earliest stages of life, where personal, moral, and
religious preparation is developed, much attention still
remains in reactive and self-indulgent physical, emotional,
and mental patterns. But as the stages of true practice of
the Way develop, there is less and less of the mechanical
and self-conscious attachment to the structures of the
body-mind.

As the Way develops, the entire
lower body-mind becomes Awake in the prior Fullness of the
Divine. Thus, social, dietary, sexual, and other areas of
habit and obsession gradually relax and are sublimed through
ecstatic Communion with the Divine. As a result, by the time
the devotee makes the transition to the esoteric order,
there is no longer any overriding need to indulge such
habits, and he can easily and naturally maintain a daily
practice that is wholly regenerative, moderate, and free of
the accumulating effects of enervation, toxicity,
distraction, reactivity, doubt, and unlove.

People everywhere are profoundly resistive to the matter of actual spiritual practice. Individuals are inclined to continue in the third stage of life and not to go through the crisis of a transition beyond it.

See more: Confront the Crisis of Transition to the Fourth Stage of Life