Balance & Imbalance--Situational Awareness In Magical Practice

From my first teacher of magical endeavors on, all have agreed that a practitioner must sustain a balanced awareness in the face of events and experiences that will unbalance awareness. Most would insist that seekers needing therapy in the broader sense should undertake that task before they took up a course of inner work. Some have referred seemingly unbalanced seekers to therapeutic modalities, conventional or alternative. Some have shared techniques to heal some sorts of pre-existing unbalances.

One of the first skills that my very first teacher passed on to us young teenagers was the skill of finding an absolutely safe place for ourselves in the inner realms and working out a way to go there at once when we encountered something likely to unbalance us.

Looking back, I gotta say that this little skill has kept me from tumbling into dissociation many, many times.

I think that it would be far more dangerous to venture into inner work if a seeker were unable to sustain a balanced awareness, no matter how acute her or his perception might be, or how extraordinary her or his sensitivity, or how how marvelous her or his reports of the paranormal.

Here, I think that we need to distinguish among a variety of character faults and personality dysfunctions. As well as take into account changes that occur as a result of esoteric practice as opposed to faults and dysfunctions that pre-exist beginning a course of practice.

Let me add that each of us follows the path that we pick. It's certainly possible to pick a path that favors one's character faults or exacerbates one's dysfunctions, yet gain some success and reputation as a practitioner. Sometimes notable success and reputation.