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Agonies & Ecstasies More Agonies There are additional agonies — guilt, periods of self-doubt, an ongoing sense of inferiority or a painful, lonely arrogance which just won’t go away. You also agonize that you should be more patient and yet you find yourself extremely impatient. Then you become impatient that you are not developing patience faster. It would be funny if it didn’t hurt so much. But it does. It’s agony. Plateaus are often miserable experiences, too. Perhaps only a month ago you were doing fine. You made genuine progress and were experiencing many of the ecstasies. "But where did the ecstasies go?" you ponder. "Nothing new has developed for weeks! I’m trying. I’m working hard. I’m doing my part! But goodness, what a barrier, what a plateau. Will I ever break through? Will I ever go onward and upward again? Is this the level I’m going to have to live on? I’m stranded between two worlds, between my old self and the impossibilities of my hopes. Boredom is quite agonizing, too. When nothing new is occurring, while at the same time your friends are doing very well, it’s especially difficult to deal with boredom. "Something’s supposed to happen. I’m making the effort. I’ve studied the website. I visited the Gurus and Masters. Nothing’s happening. There’s nothing to this stuff. I’d be better off playing solitaire," you moan at times. Worse than the agony of the plateau or the boredom is failure. At times most everyone tries to move forward, tries to become more conscious. However, due to old tendencies, you discover frustration and blockage instead. You develop the feeling you cannot break through. You start to think everything you try won’t work. Your sense of self hurts, and your esteem goes down the tubes. You know, "for a fact," you’re a failure. General doubts flood your mind. You wonder if you can ever, even if given a hundred million lifetimes, find your higher consciousness, make the grade. Failure is agony. Not only is failure so painful, but other people seem so superior, so able, so successful compared to you. Your sense of failure adds to your sense of separation from them — often initiating jealousy and subsequent possibilities of hatred. While your failure looms larger and larger in your mind, the successful people around you seem to be a different and superior species.
Also, your own personal superstitions give you a rough time. Due to your lack of training, you don’t understand the goodness or beauty of the higher consciousness. You fear high intuitions may command you to give up your career, to go fight such things as the tsetse fly in Zambia. You might also be afraid that suddenly you’re going to project your consciousness out of your body and who knows where you’ll go — and what if you can’t get back into your body? You may fear that, while you’re out in the blue in elevated consciousness, friends will think you’re dead and gone; undertakers might embalm your body before you’re able to comment. This kind of doubt and ignorance is indeed agonizing, too.
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