“In the ancient temples of Egypt and Chaldea they used to tell the neophyte that whenever he met some truly congenial companion during his subsequent career, it would be a sign that the time of his probation was nearing to the end and that he was soon to be recognized and accepted as a disciple of a great Master. As a rule, those who enter upon the path must dwell alone; solitude and loneliness are their lot. It is only when they have learned to stand alone and to remain unshaken that they are allowed the companionship of a friend. The social life of a man distracts the soul and makes it depend upon the whirl and change of events for its sustenance. When the soul is to awaken to its new and true life, these kaleidoscopic changes must give way to constancy and unity. This cannot be the case until man has been tried and proven in the furnace of affliction. When he has tasted of the bitterness of life’s cup and emptied it to the very dregs, when one after the other of what we call life’s joys have been taken from him and he has lost his health, his possessions and his friends too, then a sense of utter loneliness comes upon him and he enters what the mystics call the great void. Here he has to stand his trial. If he passes it successfully, he is admitted into the inner court of the temple, and permitted to know the true character of his Karma and the laws under which it operates.” – See more at: http://immortalempyre.com/spiritual-companionship-between-man-and-woman/
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“From the ancestors he received signs that things must decompose if they are to give birth to immortal fruits of time. From the hidden masters of the tribe he learnt that evil must triumph for a season if an even greater good that will change the world is to come into being; that good, in its gentleness, needs its true character and resolve tested, primed, and strengthened by the suffering brought on by evil; only then will good have the moral force, and the great integrity, and the deep certainty, and the boundless power to step forth and overcome evil and transform the world into the reality of a higher vision.” – Starbook, Ben Okri
And then these two texts led me to remember yet another aspect of these trials. The rites of passage that are still done today in some tribes when a boy reaches the age of knowing. Rituals that in the modern society are lost and are no longer part of the few traditions that would be worth to keep. For this loss, the mindset and way of being of whole countries plunged into a state of semi-consciousness. Only in the shamanic arts this practice can still be found if we happen to live outside of a culture that doesn’t know anything about it.
“At the heart of the modern crisis of manhood is the extension of adolescence, a boyhood which is stretching on for a longer and longer period of time. Once thought to end in a man’s 20s at the latest, men are extending their adolescence into their 30’s and in some especially sad cases, their 40’s.
But in some ways it’s not their fault. It’s the fault of a culture in which rites of passage have all but disappeared, leaving men adrift and lost, never sure when and if they’ve become men. Today’s men lack a community of males to initiate them into manhood and to recognize their new status.
Across time and place, cultures have inherently understood that without clear markers on the journey to manhood, males have a difficult time making the transition and can drift along indefinitely. Thus, rites of passage were clearly delineated in nearly every culture as one of the community’s most important rituals.
While almost every culture had a rite of passage ritual, there existed a great diversity in what these ceremonies consisted of. The common thread was an experience that involved emotional and physical pain and required a boy to pass the test of manhood: to show courage, endurance, and the ability to control one’s emotions.” – http://www.artofmanliness.com/2010/02/21/male-rites-of-passage-from-around-the-world/
I would say that it is not uncommon these days to see both men and women behaving like children even well above their 40’s, engaging in mindless discussions over the most insignificant things. The dark night of the soul, or the 3 days of darkness that so many took it literally and externalized it, is a period in our own development when we face our own dragons, and it should come to everyone if there is at least a minimum amount of non-conformism with the powers that be…