The practice of the Art is different for every person. As a result, it falls upon every student to explore and assert his understanding. It is your own experience that defines your relationship with Power, and that relationship will change over time. It is upon the teacher to understand and nourish the development of that relationship, and to allow the student proper license to become.

It is perhaps the greatest and most common of sins a teacher can commit, to inhibit the students growth by assembling around him a system of reinforcement that restricts growth to the manner the teacher desires. Not just in the Art is this true, but in all things. An environment of learning must be a sandbox where the rules of nature and life may be tested and explored. Too much structure and the student does not learn to perceive the natural laws on his own. Too little structure and the student does not learn to communicate those laws.

Nature gives us the opportunity for this learning if we will allow it. Students are generally inferior to their teachers in many ways. A child is less strong, less fast, but more difficult to damage. This has not only an evolutionary benefit, but allows children the lattitude to explore their world with less risk of harm to themselves or those around them. So it is with the student of the Art. A new practitioner is less able to harness powers that will do upset to his life or the lives of others. He is protected by his inexperience and is less easily damaged because he is less easily influenced by the forces he seeks to control. (This is in some circumstances not the case.)

Knowing that our children, our students, are less likely than our teachers to do damage to themselves or others, and less likely to be damaged in general, it is absurd to impose a set of rules upon them that is structured to our own discipline. Better for them to play in the sandbox, to discern the natural shapes their hands make of the world, to understand the way the sand behaves when wet and dry, to make simple mounds and towering spires.

And from this play one can determine the character of the student, and evaluate his nature and suitability. Does the student discern those natural laws? Does he experiment with different consistencies of sand? Does he recognize results and is he able to replicate them? Does he, instead of learning, simply reuse the same buckets and molds to make the same tired sandcastle day after day? How does he behave in a sandbox with other students. Does he lift them up or tear them down? Does he sabotage their efforts? Does he keep what he has learned to himself or share it?

As teachers, it is only by observing this behavior in an unrestricted environment that we can determine the character of our students and whether or not they are suitable for deeper teaching. I do not say now that students should be accepted and then abandoned after some flaw is found. Our duty as teachers is not to find the best and improve them, but to aid in the growth of all who come to us. Unless there is strong cause a student should never be dismissed. He should be nurtured and helped along his path with care and attention. If his character makes him unsuitable for what he wishes to learn, you must offer him the opportunity to alter himself, to grow into the person he wishes to be.

If a student wishes to be a teacher, but guards his own discoveries jealously, assign him to teach the fundamentals he was taught. Show him how to release the posessiveness he has for his knowledge. Encourage him to write about his understandings and knowledge, and share those words with others. If a student wishes to be a priest, but lacks compassion, assign him a course of denial in some way, make of him an ascetic first, and then a healer. Let him minister to the dying, to the hungry, to the cold.

There is no time frame upon these studies. The student will learn the lesson and his character will be what is required for his desire, or his desire will change. In this, you too must be changeable. Your perceptions are your own, and you must determine their vailidity constantly. Too, a teacher must not let the past cloud the present. The goal of the Art is always change. Holding on to the past too firmly, refusing to forgive or release, does not serve this goal. Nor does it serve the student, or the teacher. We know that we are not the same as we once were. Allow the student that same change. Remember who he once was, but see also who he now is.

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The necessity of motion:

Our Art is one of change. To change, one must be in motion. Power forced to stillness corrodes the vessel that carries it. In our spirit we must be calm and still, but in our power we must always be in motion. Our Power must always move, even when we are waiting for fullness. Stopping that flow impedes us and the nature of our Art.

We must be motion, as fluid and graceful as the mighty benu bird, settling upon a golden capstone. We must be motion, as fierce and undeniable as a tidal wave. We must be motion, vital and alive. absorbing and expelling the light at all times.

When one is in motion without stillness of spirit, he acts recklessly and without foresight. His plans come to ruin for their repurcussions.

When one is in motion with stillness of spirit, he acts with knowledge and awareness. His Art is given grace.

When one is still and is without stillness of spirit, he does not act but slowly dies. His Art will turn upon him and and chase the soul away if it can.

When one is still and has stillness of spirit, he is consumed by fear and doubt. His Art will die in his hands, and his heart will wither. He is as a mundane, but will always long for his Art.

In the stillness of spirit we understand. We know. In the motion of power there is change and light. By letting the power free of its shackles and maintaining stillness of spirit, the Power simply moves, it gives us the balance to Will, to Create, and to Change. Trust the Power. Trust that it will be there, that it will flow through you and mate with the nature of what is. Power is not a quantity that can be captured and reserved. It is not a commodity or a resource, but a fact of being. And we must be with it.