Until one has become adept in the art, invoking the presence of the Overself through sitting in meditation calls for considerable patience and the capacity not to stop through depression or irritation because good results are not immediately apparent. In this point, the art is likened by the ancients to sitting in the antechamber of a palace while waiting for an audience with a reigning monarch. A man may have to wait the monarch's pleasure for hours, perhaps, before he is able to see him. Or he may not. But if during the waiting period he rises in annoyance or despair or impatience and goes away, then he will certainly lose the chance of seeing the king, whereas by curbing these emotions and sticking to his aim, he may eventually succeed in it. Again, the practice of meditation is like the digging of a well. You keep on boring downwards into deeper and deeper ground. Yet although the work is arduous and irksome, you see no water until you are nearing the end. In just the same way, you meditate day after day apparently without results; but lo! one glorious day the water of spiritual life suddenly appears. Every time he sits for meditation and faithfully sticks out the allotted period despite its dryness and despite its apparent barrenness of result, the student is working on deep-rooted materialistic habits, tendencies, complexes, and extroversions within himself. The advance which he makes is consequently slight and slow at first, but it is there. If it is so inconsiderable in the early stages, the cumulative effect begins to show itself as considerable in the later stages. In the end, it will be as difficult for him not to meditate--or even to bring each individual period of meditation to an end--as it was difficult to continue it during the novitiate. However, to overcome this problem of dryness and barrenness pertaining to the earlier stages, it will be wise for the beginner to remember that it is unnecessary for him to tax his strength and patience by over-long practice. He may begin with a fifteen-minute period and should increase this only when the desire, the urge, and the encouraging feeling of progress inspire him to do so. Even then the increases should be quite small and at intervals, so that if he rises to a three-quarter-hour period it may happen only after a whole year's daily effort. When the aspirant is sufficiently advanced he will, however, do better by dispensing altogether with the thought that he should limit himself to a particular length of time for his practice. The fact that he is seeking what is ultimately a timeless consciousness should now begin to affect his practical approach and mental attitude, should now free him from any feeling he unconsciously assimilated from the breathless haste and restless tumult of modern conditions.
-- Notebooks Category 4: Elementary Meditation > Chapter 2 : Place and Condition > # 302
