Study Themes

excerpt from Idries Shah's Learning How To Learn


1. All approaches to a study or an individual may start with a
desire for attention. However they start, they must never end up
in this manner.

2. Study the assumptions behind your actions. Then study the
assumptions behind your assumptions.

3. 'Why did I do such-and-such a thing?' is all very well. But
what about 'How otherwise could I have done it?'

4. You have come a long way, and you do not know it. You
have a long way to go, and you do know what that means.

5. In respect to some, you may have advanced. In relation to
others, you have not progressed at all. Neither observation is
more important than the other.

6. If your desire for 'good' is based on greed, it is not good, but
greed.

7. Exercise power by means of kindness, and you may be
causing more damage than you could by cruelty. Neither approach
is correct.

8. The man who knows must discharge a function. The one
who does not, cannot arrogate one to himself; he can only try to do
so.

9. Do not try to be humble: learn humility.

10. Assume that you are part-hypocrite and part heedless, and
you will not be far wrong.

11. To copy a virtue in another is more copying than it is virtue.
Try to learn what that virtue is based upon.

12. No practice exists in isolation.

13. If you seek a teacher, try to become a real student. If you
want to be a student, try to find a real teacher.

14. The more often you do a thing, the more likely you are to 
do it again. There is no certainty that you will gain anything
else from repetition than a likelihood of further repetition.

15. At first, you are not worthy of the robes and implements of
the Sufi. Later you do not need them. Finally, you may need them
for the sake of others.

16. If you cannot laugh frequently and genuinely, you have no
soul.

17. When a belief becomes more than an instrument, you are
lost. You remain lost until you learn what 'belief is really for.

18. When a dervish shows interest in your material welfare, you
may be pleased. But it is frequently because you are not yet ready
for anything else.

19. When someone asks for you to help in doing something, do
you imagine that it is because he cannot do it unaided? Perhaps
he is a Sufi who wants to help you by connecting you with his
task.

20. If you are lazy, count yourself lucky if someone points this
out, giving you a chance to improve. Laziness is always your
fault. It is the sign that a man has persevered in uselessness for
too long.

These points are in fact exercises in outwitting the false self,
which thrives on smaller satisfactions. The Sufi aims at Fana
(passing away-of the False Self) and Baqa (remaining - of the
Real). Behind the supposed "I", which is impermanent, lies the
real one, which is characterised by the awareness of truth, of
reality.

And listen to the words of Junaid of Baghdad, when he said:
'A good-natured sensualist is better than a bad-tempered so-called
Sufi.'


From Idries Shah's Learning How To Learn, p.90-92