we take one step forward and two back, the teacher will keep after us, toughening our resolve, chastising us for faults and errors, stripping down what must be removed and scraping away the qualities which cling to us like barnacles.

All this seems reasonable, comprehensible, but what does it mean for one being actually to merge with another, how are we to understand what this entails? Think about falling in love, we think, breathe, sleep, eat and exist for the beloved, we are obsessed, our reality consists of the beloved, we are blind and deaf to anything else, material or non-material. This is the starting point, the beginning of our connection to the Sufi master which grows as our qualities, thoughts and actions are modified in the scorching sun of his presence, the overwhelming availability of the divine in his existence, the purifying bath of instruction. When we understand that the attributes of a perfected human being, the patience, love, wisdom, compassion, mercy, tolerance, contentment, justice, truth, the surrender, purity, sincerity, gratitude and trust, when we understand that these qualities are what make him inseparable from God we acknowledge the importance of developing them in ourself, qualities which might be dormant or embryonic but there. As they mature within us, slowly or

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