The Starry Tracks
Three Rumi poems provide beautiful, but stringent observations and advice about the destructiveness of our egoism and what it will take to transform it. Mevlana’s “roasting” of us is done beautifully, gently, and gives us great hope.
The first poem is about the pain bad habits cause in others and ourselves. Relief occurs in several ways: noticing our pain; bringing courage, strength and great energy to moments when we see our false self; and seeking and relating with a mature human being or the teachings of mature human beings. The fire of egoism, desires and self disappears in the Light and Love of the Divine which arrives through mature human beings. Their maturity irresistibly elicits our own love.
Vivid metaphors and insights in the second poem—animals; angels; the beauty of Joseph; demons; the jungle; the subtle transference of conscious thought energy as well as its transformative effects on animals; a hidden way well known by a lion; hearts ensnaring their prey; and the precious pearl—encourage us to recognize and work in a productive way with our dynamic, changing, unpredictable human nature and temperament and their subtle but real energy. Transformation results not just from the girding of our loins and struggling with what we discover in our natures and temperaments. It benefits from recognizing the value of wisdom in the hearts of mature human beings as well as doing what it takes to learn and internalize that wisdom. Aid arrives by consciously connecting to the invisible spiritual world—which is real, ever present, timeless, and spaceless.
The third poem notes there are differences in what each person needs to mature. If what is being taken in is not what is actually needed, a correction is in order. Recognize that we have a natural sense for how essential to our well being it is to spend time in the Light of God. Our desires for what is not good for us disorient this natural sense. We imagine and become misguided that the bad is actually good for us. Continuously taking into ourselves the things of the material and visible world ails us—doing so gradually makes us pale, weak and faint. The remedy: turn to the Divine for what we need in accordance with Divine Order. Follow pathways made by human beings who made a complete breakthrough, who came to completion. Their example, spiritual presence and energy opened up a path humans can follow where there was none. The Grace of God operated through great human beings to facilitate the process of transformation for us.
There’s exploration of helping people recognize that we are spiritual beings living on many levels simultaneously and if we are not, if we don’t know that, then we’re not even fully human. Being whole and coherent where the outer is equal to the inner in a state of integrity and in complete surrender helps. A number of G.I. Gurdjieff sayings bring humor to the exploration of the poems’ themes.
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