Srinatha Raghavan posted the following meaningful piece on fb some hours ago.
When you follow a certain spiritual discipline sincerely, one that promises you Self Realisation, know for certain that it will shake the very foundation of your existence, before it grants you entry into the promised land.
Many spiritual aspirants who are excited to walk the path, do so for a while and when they face "Karmic Cleansing" as I call it, they get shit scared and abandon it midway. Serious Spiritual Disciplines can bring out the latent Karmic residues from deep within and can express itself as unexpected diseases and troubles. This is an undeniable and unavoidable fact. You can't escape your Karma?
I can vouch for the above statement, that there comes a time in every sincere Sadhaka's life, when his/her world is turned upside down, by a stroke of Fate, just to test his/her Faith. He/She becomes so strife with difficulties, that many questions crop up in their minds, as to what did they do so wrong to deserve it?
Well, wrongs happen to make you right!
Certain paths demands the highest personal sacrifice to reach the apex of realization. Just like climbing a Mountain, it will get harder and harder with each step and a time will surely come, when you will be forced to make a choice, either to unburden the cargo you are carrying on you or to abandon the trek midway, for the lack of strength to carry on with the load.
Spiritual Disciplines are very tough to carry on singularly, for prolonged periods of time, hence many choose to walk different paths at different times, as they are unable to face the extreme challenges of walking one path till the end of time.
Many embark on the journey, but very few actually walk it and even amongst that few, only a handful manage to considerably stick with it and maybe one or two, through their sheer dint of determination and devotion manage to reach the end.
Alas! The rest who walk, either do out of desperation or out of exaggeration and very few out of silent inspiration.
Walk if you must, but walk till the end...that's the real deal!