BROTHER OF OLD:

There are, in my group of disciples, certain people who are outstandingly called to live the life of the sannyasin, the life of [314] the one who - having fulfiled the duties of the scholar, of the householder, of the family man, and of the business man - is now called to that attitude of life and that orientation to other purposes and goals which we technically call that of the sannyasin, or the teaching disciple. In the olden times, such a man left his home and his business and went out into the world, following the gleam, seeking the Master, and ever teaching as he went. Today, in the life of our Western civilization and under the dawning influence of the New Age, the call remains the same but the disciple goes not out, leaving all the familiar scenes behind and negating his outer usefulness. He remains where he is, continuing with the outer and physical fulfilment of duty, but within a great change and a definite reorientation takes place. His attitude to life and affairs is basically altered. His whole inner life tendency becomes that of a planned withdrawing. He is passing through that stage upon the Way to which Patanjali refers in The Yoga Sutras under the term "right abstraction." It differs somewhat from the process called "detachment," because that process or motivated activity is applied primarily to the astral-emotional nature, to the desire life, whatever those attachments or desires may happen to be. This is a mental activity; it is an attitude of mind which affects primarily the entire life-attitude of the personality. It involves not only the detachment of the desire nature from that which is familiar, desired and appropriated from long habit, but it involves also a complete readjustment of the entire lower threefold man to the world of souls.

It is here that right habits and attitudes in life to the world of business, and of family relations play their part, enabling the sannyasin to "continue on the upward way with heart detached and free," and yet to do so whilst performing right action, through right habit and right desire, to all with whom his lot is cast. To this difficult task your soul is now calling you. It constitutes your major life problem: To stand free whilst surrounded; to work in the subjective world whilst active in the exterior world of affairs; to achieve true detachment whilst rendering to all that which is due. An understanding of your ray types may greatly aid in this process of release, of relinquishment, and of final renunciation. [315]

The ray of your mental body is the fifth, and because it is the same ray as that of your personality, you will have to guard with care against mental crystallization, and the undue influence of the critical mind. This ray gives you ability in the field of knowledge, but it must be balanced by the unfoldment of the intuition; it gives you the power to master your chosen field of knowledge, but that power must be balanced by the simultaneous mastering of the world wherein love and wisdom control.

Your astral body is on the sixth ray but, as in the case of I. B. S., its major quality is devotion and devoted persistence, and not fanaticism. This energy is of immense value to you because it is, curiously enough, your only link with the great second ray of love in this particular incarnation. But it is a strong and powerful link.

Your physical body is controlled by the seventh ray, and this, as you will note, is also along the line of 1, 3, 5, 7. This is a point upon which you should ponder and reflect, for the aggregate of your ray tendencies constitutes for you a problem, and your sixth ray energy contributes the only balancing factor. And yet, my brother, you are in many respects well balanced. One hint I would here give to you in this connection and to all of you who study these instructions. The ray of the personality in a previous life leaves definite habits of thought and of activity; it has built into the life rhythm certain unalterable tendencies for which much gratitude can sometimes be felt. This is so in your own life. In a previous incarnation, your personality was on the second ray, thus leaving you with a deeply loving and understanding nature and a power to include, which is a major asset; it serves to offset the first ray tendencies which are so dominant in this particular life. It is hard for the disciple who sees not the picture whole, and who only knows the quality of the present life and its natural tendencies (due to ray influence) to think truly about himself.

Your rays therefore are: