“Initiation is life itself, lived intensely, with rectitude and with love”
~ Samael Aun Weor
Esoteric initiations are a crucial part of the path to liberation. They are integrated in the Three Mountains (which are the three major stages of the path), each of those consisting of eight initiations, so there are 24 in total, and the last one being when the third mountain is completed, which is when we incarnate Ain – the ‘grandfather’ of our Being/Higher Self; making it the 25th one.
The esoteric initiations entail a process of transformation through intense learning, tests and trials, through which we then purge ourselves from the low and heavy vibration (the egos) as the technique for rescuing the consciousness is applied in daily life. The initiatory trials serve to learn how we cope with obstacles or anything that may arise so that our egos are stimulated to reaction. It can, for example, be a circumstance in life that has changed from a comfortable one to a less tolerable one, so that we can see and learn about our inner defects.
When we eliminate our egos that arise as a consequence of a situation we are in, we liberate consciousness that was trapped inside them, and with it an inner change takes place, so that a situation that normally we would react to a lot, we no longer react in the same way. It’s not that we are indifferent towards it, but rather that we have understandings about it that we didn’t have before; and as our consciousness expands in size, it helps us to ground in a peaceful awareness that the consciousness is.
Initiations are set for us by divine beings, and our own Being also forms big part in this process of our awakening. Esoteric initiations are not really events, but rather a learning process integrated into life itself. On the path we learn to see that what happens in our life could very well be related to various initiations – these are situations that span from very difficult ones, like illnesses, to common every day one, to pleasant and comfortable situations. In order to go through them successfully, it is necessary to eliminate the defects and not allow ourselves to be dragged in any form of identification with life that could make us forget ourselves and react with egos. Otherwise, we could get stuck on an initiation for quite some time.
The initiations of the path are essential for our ascension, because for each completed one we get a strong increase in our vibratory energy, the Kundalini rises in a spiritual body that was being created within; the higher body is received, and a part of our Being is incarnated. All of these give us enormous amount of strength to augment our work and bring it to a new level, which is needed because each subsequent initiation entails more and more effort from the aspirant, or in other words they become harder and harder, but at the same time the rewards are greater and greater, and proportionally to that we become stronger and more capable to deal with them.