Occultism is an art. It is an inner art. Occultism is a science. It is an outer science. Occultism as an art awakens and inspires our inner life. Occultism as a science energises, stimulates our outer life. A great occultist is a dynamic athlete. He fights against doubt. He fights against impurity. He fights against imperfection.
If you want to be an occultist, a divine athlete, then your life-boat has to ply between the shores of self-observation and self-correction in the river of emotion. That is to say, the human emotion has to be curbed, perfected. But the divine emotion has to be practised, enlarged. This divine emotion makes us feel that we are in God, with God and for God. Human emotion is otherwise. It binds us and with the help of this emotion we try to bind others. Here we play the game of possession — to possess and be possessed. But the divine emotion is something else. Here we enlarge our consciousness. We transform our earthbound life into the infinite expanse of light.
An occultist has a universal mind. This mind is his watchtower and he has an eye, which we call the ‘third eye’. Apart from the two eyes, we have a third eye which is in between the eyebrows, a little above. This eye is the eye of vision. This eye an occultist uses as a dynamic, successful and effective weapon.
An occultist has two names — an inner name and an outer name. His inner name is Unwavering, Unswerving Concentration. His outer name is Dynamic Revelation.
In our spiritual life we notice two brothers, occultism and spirituality. Occultism teaches us how to be brave and quick in the battlefield of life. Spirituality teaches us how to be pure and sure, in all spheres and activities of life. Occultism wants to conquer time and space. Spirituality wants to conquer darkness and ignorance. When occultism wants to conquer time and space, it wants to do it in the twinkling of an eye. And when spirituality wants to conquer darkness and ignorance, it does it at God’s choice hour, at God’s chosen hour.
Occultism has no time for daydreams, idle dreams. An occultist has no time for idle daydreams, but he has all the time to see the face of willpower, adamantine willpower within us. He has all the time to see victory’s crown here on earth.
Now, there are various types of occultists, but we can put them into three major categories: an ordinary occultist; an occultist who is a little bit higher and an occultist who is of the highest type. An ordinary occultist will do many things contrary to the divine law, divine dispensation. For name and fame he will do quite a few things which are damaging and destructive.
Here I wish to tell you of an instance. There were three occultists. One occultist lived near a restaurant and he didn’t have enough money to buy anything. Every night he used to threaten the proprietor of the restaurant occultly. He used his occult power and threatened him and commanded him to send him, three times a day, the most delicious meals. It went on for months and years. The proprietor used to send meals three times to this occultist because he was being ruthlessly threatened at night.
Now the second occultist used to live near a courthouse. Everyday he used to see hundreds of people coming out of the court. He used to tell them what was happening in the farthest corners of the globe. They were all wonderstruck to know what was happening in distant countries. And the following morning in the newspaper, everything was proved to be true, just as the occultist had said.
Now the third occultist used to live near a church. Everyday when the sincere seekers used to go to the church, he used to pray to the Lord Supreme to increase their aspiration, to expedite their salvation. Then after they had prayed in the church and as they came out of the church, he used to have the same prayer to the Almighty: “Oh, Father, I pray to You to give them illumination. With my occult power I wish to expedite their spiritual journey. This is my prayer to You. You have given me occult power. I wish to use it for their salvation. I don’t want them to wallow in the pleasures of ignorance. These are my brothers and sisters. They are crying for light and illumination and I wish, with Your kind permission, to use my power to expedite their life’s inner journey.”
Now, when these three occultists passed away, left their bodies, passed behind the curtain of eternity, God said to the first occultist, “I don’t need you. I don’t want you. The world of greed needs you. You go away. You are meant for the world of greed and temptation.” To the second one, God said. “I don’t want you. I don’t need you. The world of curiosity needs you. You are a miracle-monger. You have to go to the world of miracles. I don’t need you.”
To the third one, who helped the sincere seekers in their spiritual pursuit, God said: “I need you. I need you badly. You have served Me. You have served the divinity in humanity. I need you. You are Mine.”
Occultism deals with power. Unfortunately in the West, occultism has been a victim to misunderstanding. Here in the West, you have seen that black magic has taken the role of occultism. Proper occultism will never destroy anyone, will not create any calamity for anybody. But black magic, which you see here in the lowest form of occultism, has created millions and millions of problems. I knew personally six or seven persons who were victims of black magic. They came to me for help and I did help them and they are now free. In merciless ways, they were attacked by some black magicians. Now, many people will be under the impression that all this was done by real occult power. Real occult power would not create this kind of problem. It is the black magic in the lowest vital plane that creates all these problems.
So, when an occultist lives in the soul and works for the soul, he is a divine occultist. But when an occultist lives in the vital and for the fulfillment of the vital, lower vital, emotional vital, impure vital, then he is not living for the soul. He is living to satisfy his own ego, which is undivine, unrefined, obscure, impure and evil.
A genuine seeker of truth and light will not cry for occult power. Everybody has to realise God, but if one says that occult power is necessary in order to realise God, then I wish to say that one is committing a deplorable mistake. There are many occultists who have not realised God. Yes, in the far distant future everybody has to realise God. In that way they will also realise God. No son of God, no human being will remain unrealised. In that sense they are bound to realise God.
What is of paramount importance is God-realisation. When one realises God, if God wants to give him occult power, he will not be able to misuse God’s occult power. A sincere seeker will cry only for God’s light, God-realisation and God-fulfillment. He will never cry for occult power.
You all know of the great spiritual master, Sri Ramakrishna. His dearest disciple was Swami Vivekananda. Once the great master said to his dearest disciple, “Naren, I have all kinds of occult powers. I want to give you some of my occult powers.” Immediately, the disciple said to the master, “Please tell me, will these occult powers help me in my God-realisation?” The master said, “Oh no. Occult power has nothing to do with God-realisation, but if you want to do some work here on earth, at that time occult power can be of some use.” Then Vivekananda said, “No, I want to realise God first — first things first.”
So in the spiritual life, a real spiritual seeker will not cry for this kind of occult power. He will only cry for God-realisation and if God wants that particular person to work for him, naturally God will give him spiritual power, inner power and so forth to manifest Him on earth.
If one really wants God, if one really wants the transcendental truth, then one must enter into the realm of Yoga. Yoga means ‘union with God’. Once we become consciously inseparable with our divine consciousness, unlimited consciousness, then we can see, feel, grow into our highest Reality and the manifestation of this Reality is our birthright.
There are two things we always observe — the power of love and the love of power. When we enter into the lowest form of occultism, we see the love of power and we do not have to go very far for the love of power in politics, and in our daily activities we are exercising our love of power. But power of love is something different. In the power of love, it is love that exercises power, sweetly, divinely and unconditionally. That is the power of love.
Now a spiritual man, a sincere seeker after the truth, will only care for power of love and not love of power. When he is one with God, with infinite consciousness, he will see the power of love. And those who want to show the world their capacity, those who want to exercise their power of ego, will naturally cry for love of power.
We know that when the power of love divinely replaces the love of power, man will have a new name: God.
AUM 692. This talk was given by Sri Chinmoy at the American Centre for Arts, Paris, 14 November 1970↩
From:Sri Chinmoy,AUM — Vol. 6, No. 9, 27 Apr. 1971, AUM Centre Press, 1971
Sourced from https://srichinmoylibrary.com/aum_53