DISCOURSES Volume II - Avatar Meher Baba Trust

126 DISCOURSESof the Master, the Master not only can ask the aspirant to halt at theright time, but he can actually help him also to get out of thegrooves cut by his previous meditation.In this connection there is an illustrative story of a manwho was highly intelligent and who wanted to know from personalexperience what it feels like for a man to be suffocated by beingAn illustrative storyhung. He was not content merely withimagining what it would be like, but wantedto experience it himself. So he asked a friend to help him performthe experiment. He said that he would be hanged by a rope andwould signal to his friend when the feeling of suffocation reachedthe danger limit. He further asked his friend not to relieve himfrom the gallows before he received the intended signal. His friendagreed to all this, and the man was hung by tying a rope round hisown neck. But when he got suffocated he became unconscious, andtherefore he could not give his friend the promised signal. Thefriend, however, was wise, and finding that the suffocation of theman had really reached the dangerous point, he went beyond thelimits of his agreement and relieved the man just in time to savehis life. The man could be saved not through his ownthoughtfulness and precautions, but through the wise discretion ofhis friend. In the same way, it is safer for the aspirant to rely uponthe Master than upon any provisions of his own making.