Methods Of Development


The same authority, after warning students against attempting to develop

their psychic powers by unnatural and harmful practices, such as

self-hypnotism, self-stupefication, etc., gives the following excellent

advice concerning the normal development of clairvoyant and other high

psychic powers and faculties: "There is one practice which if adopted

carefully and reverently can do no harm to any human being, yet from

wh
ch a very pure type of clairvoyance has sometimes been developed--and

that is the practice of Meditation. Let a man choose a certain time

every day--a time when he can rely upon being quiet and undisturbed,

though preferably in the daytime rather than at night--and set himself

at that time to keep his mind for a few minutes entirely free from all

earthly thoughts of any kind whatsoever; and, when that is achieved, to

direct the whole force of his being towards the highest ideal he happens

to know. He will find that to gain perfect control of thought is

enormously more difficult than he supposes, but when he attains it this

cannot but be in every way more beneficial to him, and as he grows more

and more able to elevate and concentrate his thoughts, he may gradually

find that new worlds are opening before his sight. As a preliminary

training towards the satisfactory achievement of such meditation, he

will find it desirable to make a practice of concentration in the

affairs of daily life--even in the smallest of them. If he writes a

letter, let him think of nothing else but that letter until it is

finished; if he reads a book, let him see to it that his thought is

never allowed to wander away from his author's meaning. He must learn to

hold his mind in check, and to be master of that also, as well as of his

lower passions; he must patiently labor to acquire absolute control of

his thoughts, so that he will always know exactly what he is thinking

about, and why--so that he can use his mind, and turn it or hold it

still, as a practiced swordsman turns his weapon where he will."



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