To Light a Thousand Lamps - The Theosophical Society

172 / TO LIGHT A THOUSAND LAMPS
those who have become near to godlike may enter. And
since the gods are in a profound sense ourselves, the response
to our importunate demands may be a release upon
us of an avalanche of unexpended karma from past lives.
This could be shattering to the personal self, but not to the
part of us that knows deep within that we have longed to be
tested to the limit of our endurance.
William Q. Judge uses the cryptic phrase ‘‘karmic stamina’’
in connection with aspirants who may find themselves
momentarily in ‘‘a psychic whirl, or a vortex of occultism’’
into which others also may be drawn, and where the ‘‘germs
for good or ill ripen with activity.’’* The outcome will depend
not only on our constancy of will and selflessness of
motive, but also upon our reserve of moral and spiritual
endurance, our inbuilt stamina. The word stamina — from
the Latin for ‘‘warp, thread, fiber’’ — is fitting here, for the
warp of lengthwise threads on a loom is usually of stouter
twist than the weft, as it is the foundation on which the
cross threads are woven. The daily encounters and interactions
with others and the impingements of events upon
us are all karma: the warp represents the outflowing of past
experience, while our reactions, being of our choosing, are
the weft carried by the shuttle of the soul as we weave our
present and future on the warp of the past.
All is not hardship and trial. Our inner god may be a
stern taskmaster, but it is infinitely just and therefore infinitely
compassionate. To be sure, potency of aspiration
germinates whatever seeds of inharmony we have sown, but
*Letters That Have Helped Me 1:20‒1.