Finding the Light

Almost instantly your feet came into contact with an unfamiliar object. YOU put your hand on what seemed to be a push button, but no light appeared. Nevertheless, you now felt quite sure that you had located the switch. You paused, and involuntarily asked yourself, "How does this thing work? It won't push and it won't pull." Back came the answer within yourself like a spoken word. "Sidewise." You moved it sidewise, and the room as flooded with light. Your joy at thus finding a responsive intelligence within yourself could not be expressed in words. It was a rapture of the heart which many have felt at times.

Pupil: Oh, I am so glad that the switch was found through clinging to the tight mental attitude! Does such persistent effort always meet with such a satisfactory reward?

Sage: Yes, persistent, confident endeavor always brings satisfaction. In order to give you a complete picture from which you may logically reason in the future, let us consider the same situation from an opposite angle. Imagine yourself in the same room under the same conditions. After several attempts at feeling around in the dark, you begin to feel tired, more or less discouraged, and you reason with yourself thus "Oh, what is the use?There may be a light switch in this room, and the room may contain everything I require, and again it may not." But something indefinable in yourself convinces you that not only is the light there, but so, also, are the things you enjoy and desire. You answer right back to yourself, "Well, if everything is here which I need and would enjoy, what a pity that I cannot find the switch! What a strange and unreasonable way some people have of doing things! I wonder why the light was not already turned on for me."

Pupil: You make it seem that one almost involuntarily and invariably blames circumstances or people for his failures"