Question: Should we try to help someone with their spiritual development, or must they be “receptive”? What mistake can there be in presenting a few truths to others with the hope that the ideas strike a right chord within them?

Answer: There are laws that govern all things, including our own development as well as that of others. Sometimes the most difficult, yet most true, thing we can do in the moment is to let others learn what is true for themselves. Sometimes we attempt to “help others” because we are unconsciously trying to change them according to our own ideas of what they should be like. When we do this, it not only creates resistance in the person we address, but it keeps us asleep to our own interior and misguided ambitions. We must all learn to be awake around others so that we can learn to feel whether or not what that person asks is arising from a genuine wish to know.

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