However tirelessly and relentlessly he pursues the Long Path, he may come one day to the tragic discovery that the ideal it proposes to him embodies a humanly impossible perfection. With that discovery he will fall into a numb inertness, a pathetic and hopeless state which could even bring his overwrought mind not far from a breakdown. He may feel alone and deserted. He may enter into the dark night of the soul, as some mystics name it. His ego will feel crushed. He will not know what to do, nor even have the strength of will to do anything more. At this point he must wait . . . out of bleakness and weakness there will presently come a guidance, bidding him respond affirmatively to a suggestion, a book, or a teacher directing him toward what is really his first step on the Short Path.
-- Notebooks Category 23: Advanced Contemplation > Chapter 4 : The Changeover To the Short Path > # 148
