GLAMOUR, A World Problem by Alice A. Bailey Excerpt 5
Pages 74…76
THE GLAMOUR OF MATERIALITY is the cause of all the present world's distress. What we call the ECONOMIC problem is simply the result of this particular glamour. Down the ages, this glamour has held the race increasingly interested until today, the entire world has been swept into the rhythm of money interest. Those souls who stand in the light to be found upon the mountain top of liberation and those who are advancing upward out of the fogs of materiality are now sufficient in numbers to do some definite work in connection with the dissipation of this glamour. The influence of their thoughts, words, and lives will bring about a readjustment of values and a new standard of living for the race.
Students need to remember that that which is necessary varies according to the stage of evolution reached by an individual. For some people, the possession of that which is material may be as great a spiritual experience as the more elevated and fewer material requirements of the mystic. We are rated as regards action and point of view and not by our demand upon life.
Sit not in the seat of the judge or the scornful.
The gluttonous desire for possessions is not regarded as so reputable a desire as formerly. A desire for riches is not producing the clutching hands as earlier in racial history. When the desire is absent, and the man seeks nothing for the separated Self, the responsibility of material wealth can again be handed back to man, but his point of view will then be free from that glamour. Illusion in many forms may still hold sway, but the glamour of materiality will be gone. It is the first destined to disappear. Students would do well to remember that all forms of possessions and all material objects, whether it is money, or a house, a picture, or an automobile, have an intrinsic life of their own, an emanation of its own, and an activity which is essentially that of their own inherent atomic structures (for an atom is a unit of active energy) THIS PRODUCES COUNTERPARTS IN THE WORLD OF ETHERIC & ASTRAL LIFE, though not in the mental world.
These subtler forms and distinctive emanations swell the potency of the world's desire. They contribute to the world glamour and form part of a powerful miasmic world, which is on the unevolutionary arc but in which humanity is nevertheless immersed upon the upward arc. Therefore, the Guides of the Race have felt the necessity of sanding by whilst the forms set up by the man himself proceed to strip him and release him to walk in the wilderness.
THE GLAMOUR OF SENTIMENT holds the good people of the world in thrall and in a dense fog of emotional reactions. The race has reached a point wherein the men of good intention and owning a measure of freedom from the love of gold are turning their desire to their responsibilities, their effects upon others, and to their sentimental understanding of the nature of love. Love, for many people, is not really loving but a mixture of the desire to love and the desire to be loved, plus a willingness to do anything to evoke this sentiment. The selfishness of people who are desirous of being unselfish is great.
This pseudo-love, based primarily on a theory of love and service, characterizes so many human relationships such as those existing between husband and wife, parents and their children. Glamoured by their sentiment for them and knowing little of the love of the soul which is free itself and leaves others free also, they wander in a dense fog, often dragging with them the ones they desire to serve. Study the word "affection" my brother and see its true meaning. Affection is not love. It is that desire which we express through the exertion of the astral body, and this activity affects our contacts. It is not the spontaneous desirelessness of the soul which asks nothing for the separated Self. This glamour of sentiment imprisons all the nice people in the world, imposing upon them obligations that do not exist and producing a glamour that must eventually be dissipated by the pouring in of true and selfless love.
Pages 77-79
THE GLAMOUR OF DEVOTION causes many probationary disciples to wander circuitously around in the world of desire. This is primarily a glamour that affects 6th ray persons. It is potent due to the age-long activity of the sixth Ray of Devotion during the rapidly passing Piscean Age. It is one of the potent glamours of the devoted aspirant. They are devoted to a cause, a teacher, a creed, a person, a duty, or a responsibility. Ponder on this. This harmless desire along some line of idealism confronts them becomes definitely harmful both to themselves and others. Through this glamour, they swing into the rhythm of the world glamour, which is essentially the FOG of desire. Potent desire along any line, when it obliterates the wider vision, is just as hampering and is even more dangerous because of the beautiful coloring which the resultant fog takes on.
With all true aspirants, this devotional sentiment can be difficult and bring about lengthy imprisonment. One illustration of this is the devotion poured out upon the Masters of the Wisdom around their work and the work of the initiates and the disciplined disciples. Thus, a rich glamour is created, which prevents Them from ever reaching the disciple or his reaching Them.
For this glamour, Contact the greater Self through the medium of the higher Self and thus lose sign of the little Self, its reactions, desire, and intentions. Or: the pure love of the soul that is not personalized in any way and seeks no recognition can then pour into the world of glamour that surrounds the devotee, and the mists of his devotion will melt away.
Upon the Probationary Path, there comes the swing consciously registered between the pairs of opposites until the middle way is sighted and emerges. This activity produces the GLAMOUR OF THE PAIRS OF OPPOSITES, which is of a foggy nature, sometimes colored with joy and sometimes colored with gloom, as the disciple swings back and forth between the dualities. This condition persists just as long as the emphasis is laid upon FEELING, which feeling will run the gamut between joy or despair. All this is astral in nature and sensuous in quality. It is not of the soul at all. Aspirants remain for many years and sometimes for many lives, IMPRISONED by this glamour. Release from the world of feeling and the polarizing of the disciple in the world of the illumined mind will dissipate this glamour, which is part of the great heresy of SEPARATENESS.
The moment a man differentiates his life into triplicities (as he inevitably must as he deals with the pairs of opposites and identifies himself with one of them), he succumbs to the glamour of separation. Perhaps this may aid, or perhaps it will remain a mystery, for the secret of world glamour lies hid in the thought that this triple differential veils the secret of creation. God Himself produced the pairs of opposites, spirit, and matter….and also produced the middle way, which is the consciousness aspect of the soul aspect. Ponder on this thought.
Pages 80-82
As the aspirant learns to free himself from the glamours we have touched, he discovers another world of fog through which the Path seems to run. But, first, he has to free himself from the GLAMOURS OF THE PATH.
What are these glamours? Study failures of disciples through PRIDE, THE WORLD SAVIOR COMPLEX, THE SERVICE COMPLEX, and all the various distortions of reality that a man encounters upon the Path hinder his progress.
Emphasize in your own minds the spontaneity of the soul's life and spoil it not with the glamour of high aspiration selfishly interpreted, self-centeredness, self-immolation, self-aggressiveness, self-assertiveness in spiritual work…such are some of the glamours of the Path.
The battlefield for the man on the Path of discipleship is primarily that of glamour. Therefore, the emphasis has been put upon the study of Raja Yoga and the cultivation of submission to its discipline. Only through illumination can the fogs and miasmas of glamour be finally dissipated. Therefore, I would counsel you to pay more adequate attention to your meditation, cultivating ever the ability to reflect and to assume the attitude of reflection…held steady throughout the day.
You would find it of value to ponder upon the purposes for which the intuition must be cultivated, and the illumined mind developed, asking yourselves if those purposes are identical in objective. Glamour is not dispelled through the means of intuition, nor is illusion overcome by the use of the illumined mind.
Intuition is a higher power than is the mind and is a faculty latent in the Spiritual Triad.
It is the power of pure reason and lies beyond the world of the ego and of form. Only when a man is an initiate can the exercise of true intuition normally become possible. The intuition, however, will make its presence felt much earlier in an extremity or on urgent demand.
It is ILLUMINATION that the majority of aspirants must seek. They must cultivate the power to use the mind as a reflector of soul light, turning it upon the levels of glamour and therefore dissipating it. It requires a quiet withdrawal in mind and thought and desire from the world in which the personality habitually works and the centering of the consciousness in the world of the soul, there silently to await developments.
A deep distrust of one's reactions to life and circumstance, when such reactions awaken and call forth criticism, separateness, or pride, is of value. These qualities are breeders of glamour.
Illusion is dispelled through the conscious use of intuition. The initiate INSULATES himself from the world of illusion and illusory forms and from the attractive urges of a personality nature and thereby…. through the medium of ISOLATION, comes into touch with the reality in all forms, hidden hitherto by the veil of illusion. This is one of the paradoxes of the Path. Insulation and isolation of the right kindled to the right relationships. This has often been misinterpreted as a plea for the wrong kind of isolation by those with separative tendencies and selfish ends.
It is the soul itself which dispels illusion, through intuition. It is the illumined mind which dissipates glamour. Aspirants omit to discriminate between illusion and glamour. They endeavor to dispel glamour through the soul, whereas they really need to use the mind correctly. Calling in the soul to dissipate glamour may lead to an intensification of the difficulty.
The problem is that often the disciple does not recognize the condition as one of glamour.
Page 84
Glamour can always be found where there exists the following:
Criticism, when careful analysis, would show that no criticism is really warranted.
Criticism, where there is no personal responsibility involved, is not the place or the duty of the man to criticize.
Pride in achievement or satisfaction that one is a disciple, and any sense of superiority or separative tendency.
To Learn more Please consult the Book 'Glamour, a World Problem By Alice Bailey
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